THE  UNIVERSITY 

OF  ILLINOIS 

LIBRARY 
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ILLINOIS  HISTORICAL  SURVEY 


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Q^~r*—t>  n  XL   a^c^ 


MEMOIRS 

OF 

MARX  D.  HAUBERG 


MARX  D.  HAUBERG. 


.MRS.  M.  I>.  HAUBERG. 


PORTRAIT   OF   MY    MOTHER,   MRS.    JOHN    I).    HATBERG. 


MEMOIRS 


OF 


MARX  D.  HAUBERG 


BEING  A   PERSONAL   NARRATIVE  OF  THE  IMMIGRA- 
TION   OF    HIS    PARENTS    AND    THEIR    CHILDREN 
FROM  SCHLESWIG-HOLSTEIN,   1848;  A  YEAR'S 
LIFE    AND    TRAVEL    VIA    NEW    YORK,    PITTS- 
BURGH ;   IN   TENNESSEE,   ALABAMA   AND 
KENTUCKY,     AND     LIFE     IN     ROCK     IS- 
LAND    COUNTY,     ILL.,     AND     SCOTT 
COUNTY,     IOWA,     1849     TO     1 923 
INCLUSIVE 


Privately  printed 

ROCK  ISLAND,  ILLINOIS 
1923 


$— 


•J 

3 


-H3 


UR  people   were    Schleswig-Holsteiners.     I 
as  born  September  29,  1837,  in  Lustigen 


that  time  Denmark,  now  Prussia,  Ger- 
many.. When  I  was  one  year  old  my  folks  moved 
to  Kieler  Raisdorf.  I  went  to  school  when  I  was  seven 
years  old,  with  a  song  book  and  primer  under  my  arm. 
I  went  to  school  there  three  years.  When  I  was  eight 
years  old  I  broke  my  right  leg,  close  to  the  body,  from 
which  I  lay  in  bed  five  weeks  and  five  weeks  I  walked 
on  crutches. 

School  would  open  in  the  morning  with  song  and 
prayer ;  then  the  teacher  would  exhort  and  explain  dif- 
ferent phrases  from  the  Bible  for  a  half  hour  —  the 
same  as  in  Sunday  School  here  in  America.  I  never 
had  an  arithmetic  nor  a  geography  in  school.  We  had 
to  learn  so  many  verses  of  a  hymn  and  of  the  Bible 
every  week.  When  there  was  a  funeral  in  the  village 
the  school  children  sang  at  the  house,  before  the  corpse 
was  taken  to  the  church.     The  church  was  at  Preetz, 


585299 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  H AT' BERG 

one  German  mile  away.    It  would  be  four  and  one-half 
miles  in  America.     Everybody  walked. 

Father  worked  mostly  in  the  timber.  It  was  called 
the  "Vogelsang"  forest.  This  land  belonged  to  the 
Government.     Enough  timber  was  cut  in  the  fall  to 


The    Public    School    which    I    attended,    1844    to    18-17,    inclusive 
.11    Raisdorf. 

supply  the  demand,  and  during  the  year  young  trees 
were  planted  to  equal  or  exceed  the  number  cut  down 
in  the  fall.  The  last  three  years  we  were  there  I  helped 
father  plant  young  trees,  one  year  old.  Father  dug  the 
holes  and  I  set  the  trees  in.  Oak,  beech,  ash  and  willow 
were  planted  mostly.  Father  was  in  charge  of  the 
work,  and  when  more  men  were  needed  he  superin- 
tended them.  The  nursery  where  they  planted  the 
seeds  and  started  the  trees  had  a  high  fence  around  it 
so  the  deer  could  not  get  in  and  crop  off  the  young 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  HAUBERO 

trees.  The  fence  was  a  high  dirt  bank  or  wall,  five  or 
six  feet  high  with  brush  growing  on  top  of  it  so  the 
deer  could  not  jump  over  it.  They  had  lots  of  deer 
there,  and  they  were  so  tame  I  got  'within  just  a  few 
yards  of  one  of  them  one  time. 

They  had  three  markets  a  year  in  Kiel.  "Fastlom" 
or  Shrove  Tuesday  on  the  14th  of  February,  " Johannis" 
or  St.  John's  Market  on  June  24th,  and  "Magalis"  or 
St.  Michael's  Market  on  the  29th  of  September,  They 
sold  everything  imaginable :  horses,  cattle,  hogs,  veget- 
ables, clothing,  boots,  shoes,  harness,  wood,  turf,  coal, 
fruits,  etc.  It  was  customary  at  the  June  Market  for 
people  who  did  not  have  much  to  buy  a  pig,  and  in 
September  four  or  five  would  club  together  and  buy  a 
beef  cow. 

It  was  the  custom  for  the  women  to  go  to  market. 


i 

i^dfc 

Ji 

J 

I,;.. 

n    ti 

i*™itfp  f^p    *'  ^ 

Village  scene,   Raisdorf.      My   uncle,   Marx   Hauberg,   lived   in 
the  thatched   cottage  in   the   left   foreground. 


MEMOIR 8  OF  MARX  D.  HAUBERG 

Mother  would  come  home  carrying  a  little  pig  under 
her  arm.  It  would  be  tied  up  in  a  sack,  and  we  chil- 
dren would  play  with  it.  We  fed  the  pig  slop,  ground 
barley  and  peas,  and  goat's  milk.  Every  poor  family 
kept  a  goat  for  milk.  By  Christmas  time  the  pig  would 
have  grown  to  a  weight  of  200  pounds  or  more  and 
would  be  butchered.  Father  would  go  in  with  four  or 
five  neighbors  and  buy  a  beef.  He  knew  how  to  butcher 
and  they  would  share  the  meat.  They  would  take  turn 
about  carrying  the  hide  to  Kiel  and  stop  at  every 
"Gasthaus"  for  a  drink.  They  would  sell  the  hide 
and  divide  the  money. 

At  Christmas  time  we  children  would  make  what 
was  called  a  "Rummel  pot,"  made  by  stretching  a  blad- 
der across  the  mouth  of  an  earthen  jar  and  having  a 
stick  run  through  it.  When  you  worked  the  stick  it 
gave  off  a  loud  noise.  You  could  hear  it  nearly  half 
a  mile.  A  crowd  of  fifteen  or  twenty  of  us  would  get 
together  and  go  from  house  to  house  with  these  rum- 
mel-pots  or  drums.  We  would  rattle  them  and  then 
sing  Christmas  carols  and  then  wait  for  the  folks  to 
come  out  and  give  us  something.  Sometimes  they  gave 
us  "Meh,"  a  drink  made  with  honey,  or  they  would 
give  us  a  "Sesling"  which  was  one  cent. 

March  14th,  1848,  we  had  a  sale  in  the  forenoon  and 
sold  our  household  goods,  had  dinner  with  Uncle  Marx, 
father's  oldest  brother,  and  that  afternoon  went  to 
Kiel.  A  young  man  by  the  name  of  Roggenkampf 
hauled  our  trunks  and  boxes.  We  staid  over  night  with 

8 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX   D.  JIM  BERG 

mother's  brother,  Clement  Griese.  This  same  day 
Schleswig-Holstein  had  its  first  battle,  as  rebels,  with 
Denmark  for  the  same  reason  that  America  rebelled 
against  England  in  1775.  Father's  youngest  brother, 
Joachim,  and  a  brother  of  the  man  who  brought  us  to 


The  Stadt  Kirche  at  Preetz  which  we  attended. 


Kiel  were  in  that  battle  in  a  Dragoon  Regiment,  Cav- 
alry. After  this  man  had  brought  us  to  Kiel  that 
afternoon  he  rode  out  to  the  battlefield,  returned  to 
Kiel  the  next  morning  about  fifteen  minutes  before 
train  time,  and  reported  both  young  men  were  all 
right.  Father  wanted  to  know  how  his  brother  had 
fared  in  the  battle. 

We  left  Kiel  at  9:30  in  the  morning  and  arrived  in 
Hamburg  at  11 :30  and  had  dinner  and  supper  with 


MEMOIRS  OF  MANX   />.  HAUBERG 

mother's  oldest  brother,  Marx  Griese,  a  blacksmith  by 
trade.  After  supper  we  went  to  the  wharf,  where  a 
boat  was  waiting  to  take  us  to  the  ship  in  the  harbor. 
Mother  bid  her  two  brothers  goodbye  for  the  last 
time.     Mother  took   it   pretty  hard.     We   got  on  the 


The  Smithj    oi    Marx    Clemenl    Griese,    nrrj    grandfather,   ;\t 
Elmschi  nhagen,   Holstein. 

ship  just  before  dark.  The  other  people  who  were 
going  with  us  were  already  there,  thirty-five  in  all. 
We  were  seven  in  our  family,  including  mother's  sister 
Doris,  father  and  mother,  brother  Jergem  Detlef,  my 
two  sisters  Doris  and  Lena,  and  myself. 

The  ship  left  the  harbor  somtime  during  the  night. 
The  next  morning,  when  we  got  on  deck,  we  could  just 
see  a  glimpse  of  the  land  back  of  us.  We  came  in  a 
sail-ship  to  New  York  in  thirty-five  days.     One  night, 

10 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  HAL  BERG 

during  the  voyage,  a  terrific  storm  took  the  top  off  the 
hatch  and  the  water  just  poured  in  on  us.  Before  they 
could  get  the  top  on  again  we  were  in  two  feet  of 
water.  There  were  from  three  to  four  hundred  pas- 
sengers down  there;  and  if  there  were  any  who  had 
never  prayed  to  God  before,  they  prayed  that  night. 

We  were  in  quarantine  in  New  York  harbor  one 
day,  there  being  three  sick  people  on  board.  Mother's 
sister,  Doris,  was  one  of  them.  We  stayed  in  New 
York  three  days.  The  second  day  mother's  sister 
was  released  from  the  hospital.  We  left  New  York 
in  the  afternoon  and  arrived  in  Philadelphia  the  next 
morning,  where  we  stayed  a  day  and  a  night,  leaving 
in  a  railroad  car  drawn  by  two  horses  through  the 
city.  Outside  of  the  city  the  cars  were  hooked  onto 
a  locomotive  that  took  us  as  far  as  the  mountains. 
There  the  cars  were  attached  to  a  cable  and  pulled 
up  the  mountain.  There  were  three  passenger  cars. 
Half  way  up  the  mountain  Ave  met  three  coal  cars 
coming  down.  On  top  of  the  mountain  the  cars  were 
again  drawn  by  a  locomotive  for  a  short  distance ; 
then  we  went  down  the  mountain  without  the  loco- 
motive. 

When  we  got  over  the  mountains  we  travelled  on 
a  canal  boat  for  two  days,  then  on  the  train  again 
for  a  while,  then  on  a  canal  boat  again  for  three  days 
to  Pittsburg.  On  the  last  boat  we  met  about  an  equal 
number  of  Irish  immigrants.  They  and  the  Germans 
got  into  a  fight,  the  Irish  women  fought  the  same  as 

11 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  HAUBERO 

the  men,  and  the  boatmen  put  up  a  partition  of  soap 
boxes.  We  stayed  in  Pittsburg  a  day  and  a  night. 
Here  the  women  saw  yellow  corn  meal  for  the  first 
time,  and  remarked  "How  wise  the  people  are  in 
America;  they  mix  the  eggs  right  with  the  flour;  we 
must  have  some  of  that."  When  they  got  it  they  baked 
pancakes.  Nobody  liked  the  pancakes,  and  they  thought 
it  was  a  'sell'. 

From  Pittsburg  we  went  down  the  Ohio  River  on 
a  steam  boat  to  Paducah,  Kentucky,  and  stayed  there 
three  days,  then  got  on  a  boat  again  and  went  up  the 
Tennessee  River  to  Tuscumbia,  Alabama,  where  we 
stayed  over  night,  and  the  next  morning  got  on  the 
train  to  go  to  Decatur,  Alabama,  a  distance  of  forty 
miles.  We  boarded  the  train  about  8  o'clock  that 
morning  and  rode  all  day,  stayed  over  night  in  a  little 
town,  and  arrived  in  Decatur  about  11  o'clock  a.  m. 
the  next  day  (one  day  and  a  half  to  travel  forty  miles) . 
There  were  no  coaches,  only  flat  cars,  and  we  sat  on 
boxes.  The  roadbed  was  like  all  other  railroad  beds; 
but  the  rails  were  two-by-fours  of  wood  nailed  to  the 
ties,  with  a  wagon  tire  spiked  to  the  rails.  It  was 
blackberry  time  and  we  boys  would  get  off  and  pick 
a  cap-full  of  blackberries,  then  run  and  catch  up  with 
the  train  and  get  on.  When  the  engineer  saw  us  he 
would  speed  up ;  then  the  cars  would  get  off  the  track 
and  it  would  take  some  time  to  get  them  on  again. 
There  was  an  extra  car  with  hand-spikes,  blocks  and 
six  negroes  to  put  cars  back  on  the  tracks. 

12 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  1).  HAVBERG 

We  stayed  at  Decatur  two  days,  waiting  for  a 
steamboat  to  take  us  to  Kingston,  Tennessee,  fifty 
miles  below  Knoxville.  We  left  Decatur  June  21st. 
The  weather  was  very  hot.  We  were  on  the  boat  three 
days.  The  last  day,  the  23rd,  my  younger  sister, 
Lena,  died.  She  was  three  years  old.  A  young  boy, 
two  years  old,  died;  and  an  old  lady,  coming  with  her 
son's  family,  after  sweeping  the  floor,  sat  down  in 
a  chair  to  rest  and  died  with  the  broom  in  her  hand. 
All  three  were  buried  in  the  Presbyterian  Cemetery 
at  Kingston  on  June  24th,  1848.  A  Methodist  Prot- 
estant minister  by  the  name  of  George  Yost  preached 
the  funeral  sermon.  We  still  have  his  certificate  of 
burial. 

We  stayed  in  Kingston  two  days ;  then  moved  to 
Wartburg,  about  twenty  miles  from  Kingston,  with 
three  mule  teams,  six  mules  to  a  team.  We  forded 
one  river.  In  Wartburg,  where  we  stayed  three  weeks, 
we  saw  our  first  Fourth  of  July  celebration.  We  did 
not  understand  the  meaning  of  the  noise  in  the  mor- 
ning. I  had  to  find  out.  I  could  already  understand 
some  English  and  talk  a  little. 

There  was  nothing  doing  in  Wartburg,  so  fathter 
and  a  man  by  the  name  of  Pender,  went  to  Knoxville 
to  work.  They  helped  make  pipes  and  lay  them. 
Logs  from  one  and  one-half  to  two  feet  thick,  with 
holes  bored  through  them,  laid  end  to  end,  were  used 
to  pipe  water  to  the  city  from  a  spring  some  distance 
away. 

13 


MEMOIRS  OF  M  IRX    l>.   IIM  BERG 

We  had  lived  in  Wartburg  about  three  weeks  when 
the  boss  came,  a  man  by  the  name  of  Nerga.  My 
folks,  while  in  Germany,  had  hired  out  to  work  for 
this  man  in  America.  He  had  a  big  farm  in  Germany. 
American  agents  told  him  he  could  do  better  in  Ame- 
rica ;  that  he  had  better  sell  and  come  to  Tennessee ; 
Tennessee  was  mountainous ;  there  were  gold,  silver, 
copper,  zinc,  lead,  coal  —  all  kinds  of  minerals  in 
the  mountains ;  all  that  was  lacking  was  labor  to  get 
it  out.  So  Nerga  sold  his  farm  for  $50,000.00  and 
hired  men  in  Germany  to  get  out  the  gold  and  silver. 
He  hired  six  married  men  with  families,  four  single 
men,  two  young  maiden  ladies.  These  men  had  var- 
ious occupations  —  one  was  a  carpenter,  one  was  a 
millwright  and  a  miller,  one  was  a  blacksmith,  one, 
a  shoemaker,  one  a  weaver,  one  a  forester  (father  was 
the  forester)  and  the  rest  were  farmers;  in  fact,  they 
were  all  Jacks-of -all-trades. 

Nerga  bought  a  farm  ten  miles  above  Kingston 
on  the  Tennessee  River  —  three  thousand  acres.  About 
four  hundred  acres  were  bottom  land,  three  islands 
in  the  river,  and  the  rest  was  mountain  land,  the  right, 
and  the  ferry  boat  also  —  it  was  called  Penrock  Ferry 
—  for  $30,000.00.  He  got  all  the  implements,  horses, 
cattle,  hogs,  poultry  and  the  Post  Office  in  the  bargain. 
Tennesee  being  a  slave  state,  the  man  he  bought  of 
had  slaves.  When  the  men  and  negroes  had  moved 
out,  we  moved  in. 

There  was  a  blacksmith  shop  close  to  the  river,  tools 

14 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX   D.  HAVBERG 

and  all,  also  in  the  bargain.  All  the  mechanics  had 
brought  their  tools  with  them  from  Germany,  so  the 
blacksmith  shop  was  well  stocked  with  tools.  The 
blacksmith  went  right  to  work  and  had  all  the  work 
he  could  do. 

Father  superintended  the  farm  work  for  about  three 
or  four  weeks,  until  the  other  fellows  learned  what 
to  do.  After  that  he  helped  the  blacksmith  and  ran 
the  ferry-boat,  which  was  rowed  across  the  river 
with  oars. 

I  went  to  school  in  a  private  house  for  six  weeks. 
The  man  who  taught  me  was  from  the  North.  He 
was  the  only  native  American  I  knew  who  could  read 
and  write.  He  was  also  a  Justice  of  the  Peace.  His 
name  was  Graves.  Mr.  Nerga  had  a  large  house,  with 
one  big  room,  and  I  taught  school  in  that  room.  I  did 
not  know  much,  but  my  pupils  knew  less.  I  knew 
about  as  much  then  as  I  know  now.  I  also  acted  as 
Postmaster.  I  was  the  only  one  in  the  bunch  who 
could  speak  and  read  English.  I  was  also  interpreter 
for  the  boss.  Every  Saturday  I  went  to  Kingston 
on  horseback,  ten  miles,  to  get  the  mail.  When  the 
boss  had  business  anywhere,  I  went  along  to  talk  for 
him.  I  was  a  good  scholar  in  Germany  for  a  boy 
ten  years  old.  We  learned  the  English  letters  in  school 
there.  In  writing  and  reading,  all  I  had  to  do  was 
to  translate  them,  and  that  was  not  hard  to  do. 

We  all  lived  in  a  log  cabin,  with  a  big  fire  place 
and  a  large  wooden  chimney.     Everybody  cooked  and 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  HAl'BERG 

baked  in  the  fire  place  in  a  kettle.  Our  chimney 
caught  fire  twice  while  we  lived  there  and  we  had 
to  push  it  over,  to  keep  the  house  from  burning  up, 
and  build  a  new  one.  It  was  built  of  split  sticks 
plastered  with  clay. 

When  we  had  lived  there  about  nine  months  the 
blacksmith  and  father  got  into  a  mix-up  with  some 
moonshiners  from  over  the  river.  The  blacksmith  and 
father  were  ironing  a  wagon  box  across  the  road  from 
the  shop.  These  moonshiners  had  six  horses  hitched 
to  their  wagon  and  drove  squarely  against  the  wagon 
box  that  father  and  the  blacksmith  were  working  on. 
The  blacksmith  said  to  the  moonshiners  (there  were 
two  of  them)  in  German,  "I  should  think  the  road  is 
wide  enough  to  go  by  without  running  over  the  box", 
when  one  of  the  fellows  jumped  at  the  blacksmith,  to 
hit  him  with  his  fist;  but  he  was  too  slow.  The  black- 
smith picked  him  up  and  threw  him  against  a  rail 
fence.  The  rail  broke  and  the  fellow's  head  went  be- 
tween the  upper  and  lower  rails  and  his  face  was 
skinned.  The  upper  rail  had  to  be  lifted  to  get  the 
fellow  out. 

The  moonshiners  were  loaded  with  alcohol  and  were 
going  to  Kingston.  In  Kingston  they  got  a  warrant 
and  had  father  and  the  blacksmith  arrested  for  murder 
—  or  trying  to  commit  murder.  The  man's  face  was 
scratched  up,  all  bloody  and  his  clothes  too.  He  had 
not  washed  the  blood  from  his  face  or  his  clothes  and 
looked  as  if  somebody  had  tried  to  murder  him. 

1G 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX   D.  HAUBERG 

The  next  morning  after  the  mix-up  a  constable  and 
two  more  men  came  from  across  the  river  and  arrested 
father  and  the  blacksmith.  They  brought  two  extra 
horses  for  the  two  to  ride.  One  of  the  men  came  after 
me  —  I  was  at  home.  He  told  me  to  come  along ;  that 
they  had  the  two  arrested,  and  wanted  me  to  talk  for 
them.  "Get  right  on  here,  behind  me,"  he  said  and 
I  got  on.  They  used  their  own  ferry  boat  to  ferry  us 
over  the  river.  There  were  two  ferry  boats — one  on 
each  side  of  the  river.  Each  ferried  across  what  came 
on  his  side  but  took  nothing  back  with  him.  It  was 
getting  dark.  We  rode  about  eight  miles  through  the 
timber  and  it  got  dark  as  pitch.  The  man  I  rode  with 
was  ahead,  the  criminals  next,  and  the  constable  and 
the  other  fellow  brought  up  the  rear. 

Everything  was  ready  for  the  trial.  The  Squire 
read  the  warrant,  then  asked  them  if  they  were  guilty. 
I  said  "No".  "Bub,  how  do  you  know",  said  the 
Squire,  "ask  them"?  I  said  "I  know  they  wont  plead 
guilty."  Then  the  Squire  said,  "Proceed;  go  ahead." 
He  said  to  the  two  moonshiners,  "Get  up,  hold  up 
your  hands",  and  swore  them  in.  They  had  no  lawyer. 
The  squire  asked  the  questions.  When  they  were 
through  telling  their  story,  he  told  father  and  the 
blacksmith  to  get  up  and  hold  up  their  hands.  I  said, 
"Do  you  want  me  too?"  He  said,  "No,  you  are  too 
young."  I  think  the  two  of  them  did  not  understand 
a  word  he  said. 

Father  told  mother  the  whole  story  in  the  evening 

IT 


MEMOIRS  OF    l/.l/.'Y   l>.  HAUBERG 

of  the  day  it  happened,  while  we  were  eating  supper, 
and  I  took  it  all  in.  When  the  man  who  was  hurt  was 
telling  his  story  —  how  the  blacksmith  threw  him 
against  the  fence  and  broke  it  —  I  said,  "Didn't  you 
try  to  hit  him  first?"  The  Squire  said,  "Bub,  you 
keep  still."  I  said,  "Yes,  he  did."  The  Squire  said, 
"Bub,  if  you  don't  keep  still  I  will  put  you  in  the  other 
room."  I  said,  "He  did,"  and  he  put  me  in  the  other 
room.  I  was  not  sorry,  for  his  family  lived  there 
and  the  lady  asked  me  if  I  had  had  supper.  I  said 
"No,"  and  she  gave  me  something  to  eat :  corn  bread 
and  fried  pork. 

"While  I  was  eating  the  Squire  came  in  and  told  me 
to  come  back.  The  lady  said,  "Let  him  eat  his  supper." 
"All  right,"  said  the  Squire,  and  he  stayed  there  and 
asked  me  all  I  knew  about  the  case  and  I  told  him  what 
father  had  told  mother  at  the  supper  table  —  how  it 
happened.  When  we  got  back  in  the  Court  room  he 
told  father  he  was  clear  —  he  did  not  find  him  guilty. 
"I  find  you  guilty  and  put  you  under  $1,000.00  bond," 
he  said  to  Penter,  the  blacksmith.  Then  he  told 
father  and  me  we  could  go  home. 

Father  said  to  me,  "Tell  the  Squire  we  want  a  horse 
to  ride  home."  I  told  him  and  he  said,  "I  have  no 
horse."  I  told  father  what  he  said.  Father  said,  "Tell 
him  we  had  a  horse  to  ride  when  we  came  here  and  we 
want  one  to  ride  back  home."  I  told  the  Squire  this. 
Then  he  told  one  of  the  men  there  to  let  us  have  a 
horse;  so  we  got  a  horse  but  no  saddle.     Father  said, 

18 


MEMOIR*  OF  MARX  D.  HAL  HERO 

"Tell  him  we  want  a  saddle."  I  told  the  Squire  this 
and  he  said  to  the  fellow,  "Get  him  a  saddle,"  and  he 
did.  The  Squire  said,  "Bub,  you  tell  the  boss  to  come 
over  tomorrow  and  sign  a  bond  and  the  blacksmith 
can  go  back  home  with  you." 

When  we  got  to  the  river  we  tied  the  horse  to  the 
rail  fence  and  took  their  skiff  to  cross  the  river.  To 
get  to  our  home  we  had  to  pass  the  home  of  the  boss 
and  father  stopped  to  tell  him  what  the  squire  had 
said.  This  was  about  3 :00  o'clock  in  the  morning. 
At  about  7:00  o'clock  the  boss  sent  for  me.  He  was 
all  ready;  told  me  to  get  on.  I  told  him  we  should 
take  another  horse  with  us  for  the  blacksmith  to  ride 
home.  He  got  another  horse  and  I  rode  it.  Father 
ferried  us  across  the  river.  We  took  the  horse  with 
us  that  we  had  tied  to  the  fence,  but  it  broke  away 
and  ran  home.  When  we  got  there  the  boss  signed 
and  the  blacksmith  came  home  with  us. 

Everything  was  all  right  for  about  three  or  four 
weeks,  then  Court  opened.  Squire  Graves,  our  neigh- 
bor, told  the  blacksmith  he  had  to  go  to  Kingston ; 
Court  was  in  session.  Father  and  I  went  with  him. 
I  was  to  do  the  talking.  Squire  Graves  also  went  with 
us.  He  was  the  Court  Bailiff.  They  found  a  doctor 
in  Kingston  who  could  speak  German,  so  they  had  no 
more  use  for  me  in  Court. 

Father  and  the  blacksmith  walked  to  and  from 
Kingston  every  morning  and  evening  during  Court 
— ten  miles — and  reported  to  the  boss.     The  second 

19 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX   D.  HAUBERG 

day  the  doctor  told  them  they  should  make  application 
to  become  citizens  of  the  United  States,  which  they  did. 
When  they  reported  this  to  the  boss  in  the  evening, 
he  said,  "I  did  that  the  day  before  —  I  did  not  tell  you 
to  do  that.  That  puts  you  on  an  equal  footing  with  me. 
You  had  better  get  out." 

''I  will  see  you  about  it  in  the  morning,"  father  said. 

The  next  morning  father  asked  him  if  he  meant  what 
he  said.  He  said  he  did.  Then  father  said  to  him, 
"When  this  trial  is  over,  we  will  move." 

"I  am  sorry  to  see  you  go,"  said  the  boss,  "but  I 
can't  take  back  what  I  said." 

"Well,"  father  said,  "if  you  don't  take  back  what 
you  said  we  will  go."  The  trial  was  put  off  for  about 
a  week.  Before  they  had  a  hearing  the  blacksmith  was 
acquitted. 

When  they  came  home  that  evening  father  asked 
the  boss  for  a  yoke  of  oxen  and  a  cart  to  haul  our  goods 
to  the  river  bank.     He  let  him  have  a  yoke. 

"Will  you  leave  Marx  here  with  me?"  he  said  to 
father,  "I  will  treat  him  as  my  own  boy  and  send  him 
to  college."  Father  said,  "No,  I  will  take  him  along." 
I  think  father  and  the  blacksmith  had  about  $7.50 
between  them.  We  stayed  one  day  on  the  river  bank, 
before  a  boat  came  down  from  Knoxville  to  take  us 
to  Decaaur,  Alabama.  We  then  came  on  to  Davenport, 
Iowa. 

The  contract  they  had  made  in  Germany  with  Mr. 
Nerga  was  that  each  should  have  a  house  to  live  in, 
i'ii 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  HAVBERO 

such  as  was  customary  in  the  country  they  moved  to — 
which  was  a  log  house — the  use  of  one  cow,  a  three- 
hundred  pound  hog  and  four  dollars  in  money  per 
month.  Mother  was  to  have  seven  cents  a  day  when 
she  worked,  and  I  got  five  cents  a  day. 


The  kettle  we  brought  from  Tennessee,  in  which  mother  did  the  family  cooking. 


Mother's  sister  died  of  a  fever  about  a  month  before 
we  left  Tennessee. 

I  remember  mother  baked  bread  on  the  river  bank 
in  an  iron  kettle.  She  set  the  kettle  on  hot  coals, 
turned  the  lid  of  the  kettle  upside  down  and  put  hot 
coals  on  top.  We  have  the  kettle  yet,  or  else  my  son 
John  H.  Hauberg  has  it.  We  had  two  tripods.  We 
did  all  our  own  cooking  on  our  travels.     We  came  down 

21 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX   />.  HAUBERG 

the  river  on  the  boat  Tippicanoe.  All  our  trunks  and 
boxes  that  we  had  brought  with  us  from  Germany, 
and  in  addition  two  cane  bottom  chairs  and  a  dog, 
we  carried  with  us  to  Moline.  We  had  the  dog  on  the 
farm  until  he  died  of  old  age.  We  called  him  "Pack- 
an",  —  "Take  hold." 

We  were  three  days  on  the  boat  going  to  Decatur. 
We  lacked  $2.50  in  having  enough  money  to  pay  our 
fare.  I  told  the  Captain  to  keep  one  of  our  boxes 
until  he  got  his  pay.  "Take  them  along,"  he  said,  "you 
can  pay  me  when  I  come  back." 

Father  and  Penter  did  all  kinds  of  work  while  in 
Decatur,  mostly  digging  cellars  by  contract ;  also  hand- 
ling freight,  it  being  the  terminal  of  the  railroad  and 
the  steambot.  The  first  time  the  boat  came  back,  when 
we  heard  it  whistle  in  the  evening  as  it  landed,  father 
and  I  went  on  board  and  pa^d  the  Captain.  Father 
gave  him  three  dollars  and  he  gave  father  back  one 
dollar.  "We  owed  you  two  and  half,"  father  said. 
"Two  dollars  is  enough,"  he  said  "I  did  not  think  you 
would  pay  me  so  soon." 

We  stayed  four  weeks  in  Decatur.  From  there  we 
went  to  Paducah,  Kentucky.  We  boarded  the  train 
in  the  morning  and  got  to  Tuscombia,  Alabama,  in 
the  afternoon;  just  half  the  time  it  took  us  when  we 
made  the  trip  from  Tuscumbia  to  Decatur  on  the  same 
road.  At  Tuscumbia  we  took  a  steamboat  to  Paducah, 
Kentucky.  In  paying  our  fare  at  Paducah  we  were 
four  dollars  short,   and   father  borrowed  the   money 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX   D.  HAVBERG 

from  the  hotel  man,  where  we  stayed  when  we  went 
to  Tennessee. 

At  Paducah  we  went  to  the  foundry  to  look  for  work. 
I  asked  for  work  for  the  two.  "What  can  they  do?" 
the  boss  said.  I  said,  "This  man  is  a  blacksmith  and 
this  man  can  help,  or  he  can  do  almost  any  kind  of 
work  around  here."  The  boss  handed  me  a  piece  of 
steel  and  said,  "Tell  the  blacksmith  to  make  a  cold 
chisel  from  that." 

I  handed  it  to  the  blackmith  and  told  him  what  the 
boss  said.  He  looked  at  it  and  said,  "That  is  no  good ; 
it  is  burned."  He  threw  it  down  and  looked  around 
for  another  piece.  He  picked  up  another  piece  of  steel 
and  I  asked  the  boss  if  he  could  use  that.  The  boss 
said  he  could,  and  he  made  a  cold  chisel  from  that  and 
handed  it  to  the  boss,  who  tried  it.  It  was  all  right. 
I  heard  father  and  the  blacksmith  say  they  would  like 
to  have  a  dollar  a  day,  when  we  went  to  the  foundry. 

"How  much  does  he  want  a  day?"  the  boss  asked. 
I  said,  "One  dollar  and  a  half."  The  boss  said,  "All 
right,  he  can  go  to  work  right  away." 

Then  the  boss  said,  "What  can  he  do?"  meaning 
father.  "He  can  help  the  blacksmith,"  I  said.  "How 
much  does  he  want  a  day?"  he  said.  "One  dollar"  I 
said.  There  were  two  big  pieces  of  iron  lying  on  the 
floor,  and  the  boss  said  to  me,  "Tell  him  to  weld  them." 
The  blacksmith  put  on  a  leather  apron,  told  father 
to  put  the  iron  in  the  fire  and  blow  the  bellows,  while 
he  looked  around  to  find  what  he  wanted.     He  found 

23 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  HAL  BERG 

it.  When  the  iron  was  hot,  father  took  one  piece  and 
the  blacksmith  the  other.  When  they  had  it  welded 
the  boss  said,  "He  can  stay  too." 

Father  hired  me  out  to  the  hotel  man  for  $4.00  a 
month.  I  had  to  help  peel  potatoes,  clean  forks  and 
knives,  wait  on  the  table,  and  help  scrub  the  dining 
room.  All  the  other  help  in  the  hotel  were  negroes. 
I  had  seen  hotel  servants  sitting  down,  having  a  good 
time,  but  I  did  not  find  it  so  here.  I  have  never  in 
my  life  been  so  tired.  I  could  stand  up  and  sleep  with 
my  eyes  open.  Steamboats  would  come  from  New 
Orleans  or  St.  Louis,  up  the  river  and  down  the  river, 
from  Louisville,  Cincinnati  and  Pittsburg  and  the 
Tennessee  River  at  any  time  during  the  night  with 
passengers  wanting  something  to  eat.  Sometimes  we 
would  not  get  to  bed  before  twelve  or  one  o'clock  and 
would  have  to  get  up  at  three  o'clock  in  the  morning. 

We  stayed  in  Paducah  one  month  and  then  got  on 
a  steamboat  to  come  to  Davenport.  Mr.  Penter,  the 
blacksmith,  stayed  in  Paducah.  The  foundry  boss 
promised  him  $2.00  a  day  if  he  stayed.  Our  boat 
took  us  to  St.  Louis,  where  we  were  transferred  to 
another  boat  by  the  name  of  "Wisconsin".  We  did 
not  go  on  shore  at  St.  Louis  as  they  had  the  cholera 
there. 

Three  days  later,  about  midnight,  the  "Wisconsin" 
landed  us  on  the  Davenport  shore.  We  had  all  our 
household  goods  and  a  dog.  We  lit  our  pitch  pine 
torches,  we  brought  a  good  supply  with  us  from  the 

24 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  II AU BERG 

South,  and  made  our  beds,  crawled  in  and  went  to 
sleep.  Next  morning  at  daylight  mother  told  me  to 
get  some  dry  wood.  Below  us,  down  where  the  St. 
James  Hotel  now  is,  at  Front  and  Main  Streets,  was 
timber.  We  had  no  matches  and  we  made  our  fire  by 
using  a  steel,  a  flint  and  a  kind  of  tow.  We  would 
make  a  spark  that  would  ignite  the  tow.  We  had 
sticks  dipped  in  sulphur,  and  touching  them  on  the 
glowing  tow,  they  would  burn  like  matches. 

While  we  were  eating  breakfast,  a  man  by  the  name 
of  Beyer  came.  He  knew  us.  He  was  from  Preetz. 
His  brother-in-law  lived  in  the  same  house  with  us  in 
Germany.  He  came  to  Davenport  in  1847  the  same 
time  as  Wolf  Liitt,  father  of  August  Liitt,  now  of 
Rock  Island.  Mr.  Beyer  told  us  where  we  could  find 
Wolf  Liitt,  who  was  my  Uncle.  He  was  married  to 
Father's  sister.  They  lived  on  the  Island  working  for 
Bailey  Davenport  or  Mrs.  Lewis. 

After  breakfast  we  got  a  boat  and  went  to  see  the 
Liitt's.  We  surprised  them.  They  did  not  know  we 
were  coming;  they  knew  we  were  in  America.  After 
the  greetings  father  told  uncle  Liitt  he  was  looking  for 
work.  Uncle  Liitt  said  there  was  no  work  in  Daven- 
port but  there  might  be  in  Moline.  We  walked  over 
the  Island  and  over  the  stone  and  brush  dam,  where 
the  bridge  is  now,  to  Moline. 

There  were  two  sawmills  and  one  saw-  and  flour- 
mill  combined  in  Moline.  A  man  by  the  name  of 
Obermeier  ran  the  saw-  and  flour-mill.     Father  got 

25 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX    D.  II  VI  BERO 

work  there  at  seventy-five  cents  a  day.  I  told  Ober- 
meier  our  goods  were  in  Davenport,  on  the  river  bank, 
and  asked  him  if  he  would  send  a  team  over  there  to 
get  them.  We  would  pay  him  for  it.  He  said,  "All 
right.  I  will  send  a  team  over  to  get  the  goods."  We 
walked  back  to  Uncle  Liitt's  and  told  him  father  got 
work. 

When  we  got  back  to  Davenport  the  team  was 
there,  loading  up.  We  all  went  over  on  the  ferry  boat. 
It  cost  $1.50.  Father  had  only  seventy-five  cents;  but 
the  teamster  told  the  ferry-man  he  would  see  he  got 
the  rest  of  the  money,  as  father  was  going  to  work 
for  his  boss.  The  ferry  was  what  is  called  a  horse- 
ferry  —  a  horse  on  each  side  of  the  boat  in  a  tread 
power.  Planks  were  fastened  to  a  chain  that  went 
round  a  pully,  one  end  higher  than  the  other;  the 
horse  would  walk  on  the  plank  and  that  would  turn 
around  to  run  the  wheel,  or  paddle,  in  the  water. 

Moline  was  three  miles  from  Rock  Island,  through 
the  timber.  There  was  one  farm  between  the 
two  towns  —  William  Brooks'  farm  He  had  a 
good  orchard.  He  told  me  he  got  the  seed  from  some 
rotten  apples  that  were  thrown  from  a  steamboat  going 
up  the  river  with  a  load  of  apples  for  the  Galena  lead 
mines  in  the  year  1839  or  1840.  The  farm  was  on  the 
left  hand  side  of  the  rail  road  tracks  going  to  Rock 
Island,  where  the  street  car  runs  under  the  railroad 
bridge.  In  going  to  Moline  from  the  ferry  with  our 
load  of  household  goods,  it  being  pretty  bulky,  we  had 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX   D.  HAVBERG 

to  pick  our  way  through  the  woods,  otherwise  the  limbs 
of  the  trees  would  rub  the  goods^  off  the  wagon. 

We  moved  into  a  little  shanty,  about  eight  by  twelve, 
near  the  river  bank  between  20th  and  21st  streets 
across  a  creek — the  creek  is  not  there  now — about  four 
rods  west  of  where  the  Moline  Tool  Company  factory 
is  now,  or  at  the  East  edge  of  Sylvan  Park  where  the 
railroad  cuts  through.  Our  furniture  filled  up  the 
shanty.  We  had  a  big  chest,  about  six  feet  long,  and 
a  big  box,  one  bed  and  a  trundle  bed  and  two  chairs. 
That  filled  the  shanty.  We  had  no  stove.  Mother 
did  the  cooking  and  baking  out  doors.  When  it  rained 
we  stayed  in  doors  and  ate  our  grub  cold.  Father  and 
mother  slept  in  the  bed  and  we  three  children  slept  in 
the  trundle  bed.  I  was  eleven,  my  brother,  Jergem 
Detlef  (we  called  him  Dave)  nine  and  my  sister,  Doris, 
five  years  old.  During  the  day  we  pushed  the  trundle 
bed  under  the  other  bed,  or  there  would  be  no  room  to 
get  into  the  shanty.  We  ate  from  the  big  box.  Father 
and  mother  sat  on  the  chairs  and  we  children  stood 
around  the  box.  The  shanty  was  boarded  up  and 
down,  with  batting,  board  roof  with  slabs  over  the 
cracks. 

There  were  two  families  living  across  the  creek. 
One,  Joe  Askew  and  his  family,  moved  to  a  farm  south- 
east of  Cordova,  where  John  James  Armstrong  now 
lives.  (Sec.  6,  Coe  twp.)  Steve  Askew,  now  living 
above  Port  Byron,  is  his  son.  He  was  about  two  years 
old  when  they  moved  away  and  I  helped  him  on  the 

28 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX   l>.  HAUBERG 

wagon.  The  other  family's  name  was  Berger.  They 
had  six  girls  and  three  boys.  One  of  the  girls  married 
Ditmer  Vieths,  and  one  girl,  Catherine,  married  a 
preacher  by  the  name  of  Arndt  —  Sam  Arndt's  father. 
Sam  Arndt  had  a  cigar  store  in  Rock  Island  some  years 
ago. 

Father  worked  for  Obermeier  about  month;  then 
he  hired  out  to  Mr.  Patterson,  grandfather  to  Corinth 
P.  Curtis,  who  was  guard  at  the  Moline  bridge  a  few 
years  ago.  Mr.  Patterson  was  Road  Commissioner 
of  Moline.  During  the  fore  part  of  June  four  men 
started  to  grub  out  the  trees  and  stumps  to  make  a 
road  to  Rock  Island  where  now  Third  Avenue  Street 
cars  run.  In  front  of  where  Williams,  White  &  Com- 
pany's factory  now  stands,  and  down  towards  the 
river  (or  slough)  was  a  little  log  house  where  a  man 
by  the  name  of  Gamble  lived ;  a  little  west  of  this  log 
house  at  about  what  is  now  Seventh  Street,  Moline, 
they  started  to  grub. 

They  grubbed  the  trees  so  they  would  fall  in  a  pile 
and  burned  them.  If  there  was  a  good  saw' log,  Dave 
Sears  got  it.  Bill  Davis  and  another  man  would  come 
with  a  cross-cut  saw  and  two  or  three  yoke  of  oxen 
and  take  it  way.  The  grubbing  was  done  before  the 
ground  froze  up. 

Mr.  Patterson  kept  Father  on  the  job  burning  the 
wood  and  brush  after  the  grubbing  was  done.  He  got 
one  dollar  a  day  for  burning  and  grubbing. 

That  fall,  father  bought  and  moved  into  a  house 

29 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  HAUBERG 

located  on  the  side  hill,  on  what  is  now  Fourteenth 
Street.  Moline.  He  bought  it  of  George  W.  Bell  for 
$50.00.  There  was  about  a  half  acre  of  land  with  it. 
Adjoining  us  on  the  west  was  AlexSwander.  His  house 
is  now  No.  725,  Fourteenth  Street.  We  had  our  barn 
and  barnyard  east  of  our  house.  North  of  us  for  about 
three  blocks  was  timber,  and  no  houses  except  those 
of  William  McEniry  and  Mike  Hartzell's,  and.  at  the 
foot  of  the  hill,  14th  to  15th  Streets  was  a  low,  swampy 
place.  I  have  seen  cattle  stuck  in  the  mud  there  in 
the  spring  of  the  year,  and  helped  pull  them  out. 
Where  the  Swedish  Lutheran  church  is.  and  westward 
was  timber  so  thick,  you  could  not  drive  a  wagon 
through  it.     They  were  large  trees  of  saw-log  size. 

Father  bought  a  three-legged  cook  stove  from  Ober- 
meier  for  three  dollars  and  fifty  cents,  and  a  clock  for 
one  dollar.  He  bought  a  good  cow  and  calf  of  Bailey 
Davenport  for  twelve  dollars  and  fifty  cents.  In  the 
summer  father  had  a  week  off  from  grubbing  to  make 
hay.  It  was  wild  hay  and  we  made  it  where  East 
Moline  is  now.  Everybody  in  Moline  had  a  cow  or 
more,  and  one  hog  or  more,  and  they  made  hay  where 
we  did.  Snakes  were  so  thick  there  we  boys  would 
catch  them  by  the  tail  and  throw  them  at  each  other. 

My  sister  Elizabeth  was  born  in  the  shantay,  July 
8.   1849. 

I  carried  water  for  Mr.  Patterson  and  for  his  men, 
sometimes,  and  fished  when  I  did  not  carry  water.  I 
got  ten  cents  a  day.  In  the  winter  of  1850  I  went  to 
30 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX    D.    " 


school.  There  were  no  public  schools  in  Moline  then. 
We  had  to  pay  for  schooling  in  those  days.  I  went  to 
school  in  old  man  Gordon's  house.  He  was  the  father 
of  Daniel  Gordon,  who  died  about  five  years  ago.  Dan 
was  a  young  man  at  that  time.  The  house  is  still  stand- 
ing. It  is  No.  1714,  Third  Avenue,  Moline.  I  went 
about  two  weeks  when  I  got  into  a  fight  with  one  of 
the  boys  from  the  other  school.  There  were  two  schools. 
The  well-to-do  sent  their  children  to  the  brick  building 
on  Sixteenth  Street,  between  4th  and  5th  Avenues, 
used  for  city  hall  afterwards,  now  it  is  a  Fire  station. 
The  boys  from  that  school  came  to  rout  us  out.  I  stood 
my  ground  and  licked  the  leader  of  their  crowd.  Then 
our  teacher  wanted  me  to  apologize  and  I  would  not 
do  it.   I  told  him  he  did  not  take  any  pride  in  his  school 

31 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  HAUBERG 

and  that  he  ought  to  be  proud  that  we  had  licked  them. 
"You  had  better  pick  up  your  books  and  get  out"  he 
said  to  me.  I  said  "All  right,  give  me  back  my  money 
that  is  coming  to  me."  "I  will  give  that  to  your  fa- 
ther" he  said.  I  said  "That  was  my  money  and  I 
want  it  before  I  go.  That  money  does  not  belong  to 
my  father."  Then  he  went  into  old  man  Gordon's  room 
and  borrowed  the  money  and  handed  it  to  me.  I  had 
paid  for  two  months.  I  was  the  first  foreign  boy  in 
school  and  they  thought  foreigners  had  horns  and  they 
would  talk  and  act  outrageously.  Mother  would  say 
to  me  "Don't  fight,"  but  father  would  say,  "Don't  start 
any  fight  but  if  they  start  one  don't  come  home  licked." 

The  Gordon  family  lived  in  the  west  end  of  the 
house,  and  the  school  was  kept  in  the  east  end,  down- 
stairs. The  teacher's  name  I  believe  was  Mason. 
There  were  about  Twenty  scholars.  The  furniture 
was  a  table  and  some  benches.  They  had  no  desks  and 
when  your  turn  came  to  write  you  would  move  up  to 
the  table.  The  only  books  we  used  was  a  spelling  book 
and  McGuffy's  readers.  I  used  McGuffy's  fourth  read- 
er as  I  had  had  some  schooling  in  Tennessee.  We  did 
ciphering  but  we  had  no  arithmetic  books.  We  had  no 
geography  nor  history  or  other  books. 

Among  the  scholars  there  were  Rosa  Bell  who  after- 
wards was  Mrs.  William  Mill  of  Canoe  Creek  Town- 
ship, Julia  Ann  Withrow  who  married  Johnty  Cool  of 
Cordova  and  Ira  Pratt  who  afterwards  married  the 
sister  of  Arthur  Mead  of  Zuma. 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  1).  HAVBERO 

After  my  school  experience  I  had  three  jobs  as  a 
hired  girl,  carrying  water  and  keeping  up  the  fires 
where  the  women  were  sick. 

During  the  winter  father  hired  me  out  to  man  by 
the  name  of  Matthias  J.  Rohlf  who  was  on  the  Judge 
Grant  farm,  three  miles  north  of  Davenport,  at  four 
dollars  a  month.  He  also  hired  out  my  brother  Dave 
to  a  farmer  by  the  name  of  Untiedt  living  in  what 
they  called  the  "Probstei,"  about  6  or  7  miles  north- 
west of  Davenport,  at  two  dollars  a  month.  Dave 
was  then  ten  years  old  and  I  was  twelve.  We  were 
to  drive  oxen  to  a  breaking  plow  during  the  breaking 
season. 

I  started  to  work  about  March  10th,  1850,  with  the 
instruction  from  mother,  "Now  you  mind  and  do  what 
they  want  you  to  do.  If  they  turn  you  off  and  you 
come  home,  I  will  get  after  you  with  a  stick  and  drive 
you  back."  I  do  not  know  whether  brother  Dave  got 
the  same  instruction.  Perhaps  for  me  it  was  a  timely 
instruction. 

At  home  I  had  always  slept  in  the  same  room,  or 
in  the  room  adjoining  father  and  mother's  room,  but 
on  the  farm  I  had  to  sleep  in  a  shanty  about  eight  feet 
from  the  house,  which  was  infested  with  rats.  The 
first  night  one  bit  my  big  toe  while  I  was  asleep.  It 
awakened  me  in  a  hurry ;  and  when  I  made  a  noise,  it 
frightened  the  rats  —  they  were  not  used  to  company 
—  and  in  running  away  they  knocked  everything  down 
and  made  so  much  noise.     I  thought  the  shanty  was 

33 

Memoirs.     3. 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  HAUBERG 

tumbling  down.  If  the  river  had  not  been  between 
us,  perhaps  I  would  have  gone  home. 

The  first  three  days  I  cut  wood.  The  next  morning 
the  boss  said  to  me,  "Yoke  up  the  black  oxen  —  yoke 
the  big  black  one  first  —  and  put  them  on  the  wagon 
and  you  can  haul  manure."  I  yoked  the  big  black 
one  first,  but  I  got  it  on  the  wrong  side;  the  other  ox 
would  not  come  under  the  yoke.  He  belonged  on  the 
"haw"  side  and  the  one  I  had  yoked  up  belonged  on  the 
"gee"  side.  I  turned  the  yoke  over,  but  that  made  the 
bow  come  on  top  of  the  necks.  That  would  not  work. 
I  unyoked  this  ox  again  and  got  him  on  the  other  side. 
That  was  all  right ;  the  "haw"  ox  then  came  under  the 
yoke.  I  had  never  yoked  any  oxen  before,  nor  had  I 
seen  it  done.  I  had  seen  Bill  Davis,  the  summer  be- 
fore, drive  oxen  when  he  snaked  logs.  I  often  went 
with  him  and  had  learned  what  "get-up",  "haw"  and 
"gee"  and  "back-up"  meant  and  how  to  put  them  on 
the  wagon. 

I  hauled  manure  that  day.  The  second  day,  while 
I  was  hauling  manure,  the  boss  called  me  to  the  house 
to  help  him  a  minute.  When  I  returned  the  oxen  had 
broken  the  wagon  tongue  and  gone  into  the  field,  tak- 
ing a  part  of  the  tongue  with  them.  I  got  them  back, 
fixed  up  the  tongue,  and  had  it  about  done  when  the 
boss  called  me  for  dinner.  He  looked  somewhat  sur- 
prised when  he  saw  me  fixing  the  tongue  and  said  it 
was  a  pretty  good  job.  My  boss  had  been  a  school- 
master in  Germany,  and  I  wasn't  there  very  long  be- 

H4 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX   1>.  HAUBERG 

fore  I  made  up  my  mind  that  he  knew  about  as  much 
about  farming  and  doing  things  as  I  did. 

I  hauled  manure  that  week.  Monday  morning  he 
told  me  to  hitch  the  oxen  to  the  wagon  and  take  three 
turkey  hens  to  Mr.  Dibbern's,  who  lived  about  a  mile 
and  a  half  southeast  from  us,  and  nearer  Davenport. 
Mr.  Dibbern  was  the  father  of  Charles  Dibbern  of 
Milan.  We  left  the  turkey  hens  with  his  flock  of 
turkeys  for  two  weeks ;  then  I  brought  them  home. 
Each  hen  laid  fifteen  eggs  and  hatched  fifteen  turkeys. 
I  left  the  farm  about  November  first,  and  they  then 
had  forty-eight  turkeys,  including  the  hens.  I  am  writ- 
ing this  to  show  what  luck  some  people  have  in  spite 
of  their  ignorance.  The  turkeys  took  care  of  them- 
selves. 

After  I  returned  from  Mr.  Dibbern's,  the  boss  said, 
"Rig  up  the  plow  —  it  is  in  the  barn  —  and  you  can 
plow  the  field  across  the  road."  I  took  off  the  clevis 
and  hooked  the  ring  of  a  log  chain  over  the  clevis  and 
put  it  on  the  plow  again.  The  chain  was  about  ten 
feet  long.  I  hooked  it  on  the  yoke  ring  and  dragged 
the  plow  to  the  field.  When  I  started  to  plow  it  went 
in  beam  deep,  and  in  plowing  over  the  little  knolls,  or 
hills,  the  beam  of  the  plow  was  not  high  enough.  I 
was  plowing  up  the  yellow  clay.  I  plowed  two  rounds 
that  day.  When  I  returned  to  the  house  the  boss 
asked  me,  "How  does  it  go?" 

"Pretty  good,"  I  said,  "but  the  plow  goes  pretty 
deep." 

35 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  HAVBERO 

'That  is  all  right,"  he  said,  "I  want  to  put  wheat  in 
there." 

The  next  morning  I  plowed  a  little  more  than  one 
round,  when  a  boy,  about  my  size,  came  up  behind  me 
and  said,  "Captain,  aren't  you  plowing  pretty  deep?" 

"The  boss  wants  to  plant  wheat  in  this  field,"  J  said. 

"He  does?  Well,  you  are  killing  the  ground,  plow- 
ing up  that  yellow  clay." 

"Don't  you  plow  that  deep?" 

"No,  by  God,  we  don't." 

"How  deep  do  you  plow?" 

"I  will  show  you,"  he  said.     "Do  your  oxen  kick?" 

"No,"  I  said. 

He  went  between  the  oxen,  backed  them  up  so  the 
heels  of  the  oxen  touched  the  beam  of  the  plow.  He 
took  hold  of  the  plow  handles  and  started  up.  The 
plow  came  right  up  within  an  inch  or  an  inch  and  a 
half  of  the  top.  He  plowed  about  a  rod,  when  I  told 
him  to  stop ;  he  did  not  plow  deep  enough. 

"Well,"  he  said,  "I  guess  you  will  have  to  let  out  the 
chain  a  couple  of  links." 

Then  we  sat  down  and  talked  a  while.  He  invited 
me  to  come  and  see  him.  He  said  his  name  was  Cody 
and  that  he  lived  five  miles  east  of  there.  He  was  look- 
ing for  cattle.  I  went  to  see  him  the  following  Sep- 
tember and  found  the  place,  a  couple  of  miles  north- 
west of  Le  Claire,  but  they  had  moved  away.  His 
name  was  Sam  Cody,  an  older  brother  of  "Buffalo 
Bill"  Cody.     He  was  killed  in  a  horse  race  that  fall. 

36 


MEMOIRS  OF  .MARX  D.  HAVBERG 

His  horse  fell  with  him,  and  Sam's  neck  was  broken. 
I  did  not  tell  him  that  I  knew  nothing  about  setting 
the  plow  until  he  showed  me  how.  The  land  where  I 
was  plowing  is  on  the  west  side  of  the  Brady  Street 
road,  just  across  the  line  of  the  Davenport  city  limits 
(in  the  southwest  quarter,  Section  Twelve). 

When  we  had  the  seeding  done  we  started  out  break- 
ing for  other  people.  The  first  we  did  was  for  Mr. 
Noel's,  on  the  bluff,  where  Van  DerVeer  Park  is  now. 
That  was  all  timber  at  that  time.  Noel  had  grubbed 
out  some  trees  and  had  mowed  the  hazel  brush.  He 
mowed  it  with  a  scythe.  The  next  place  we  broke  was 
for  Claus  Vieths,  about  7  miles  west  of  Davenport.  The 
second  day  we  were  there  an  Indian  came  along  and 
stopped.  When  we  came  to  the  road  he  hailed  us.  The 
boss  was  afraid,  but  I  went  up  to  him.  He  was  riding 
an  Indian  pony  and  he  carried  a  rifle,  a  revolver  and 
a  bow  and  arrows.  The  pony's  bit,  the  saddle  stirrups 
and  rifle  were  silver  plated.  He  asked  me  how  far  it 
was  to  Davenport.  While  he  stood  there  he  would 
sometimes  look  toward  the  west.  Then  he  went  in  that 
direction  and  was  gone  about  ten  minutes  when  he 
returned  with  the  whole  tribe  —  there  must  have  been 
two  hundred  of  them.  They  had  ponies  running  loose 
with  baskets  on  each  side,  a  papoose  in  each  basket, 
and  some  were  carrying  the  tents. 

A  half  mile  north  of  us  another  breaking  team  was 
working.  When  these  men  saw  the  Indians  they  be- 
came  frightened   and  went  home,   about   eight  miles 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  HAT  BERG 

away.  When  we  got  back  to  the  end  the  boss  saw  these 
men  going  home  and  he  was  afraid  too  and  was  going 
home.    He  said  to  me,  "We  will  go  home  too." 

"If  you  want  to  go  home,"  I  said,  "go.  You  can  take 
one  yoke  and  go,  but  I  will  stay  here." 

"I  want  you  to  come  along,"  he  said. 

I  said,  "No." 

"Are  you  not  afraid  those  Indians  will  come  back? 
We  are  two  miles  from  the  nearest  house." 

"I  am  not  afraid  of  the  Indians  —  they  are  not  com- 
ing back,  they  are  going  across  the  river." 

"Go  ahead,"  he  said.    "I'll  stay  too." 

The  other  fellows  came  back  just  before  dinner  the 
next  day.  "It's  a  good  thing  we  stayed,"  the  boss  said. 
"The  other  fellows  lost  three-quarters  of  a  day." 

The  people  for  whom  we  were  breaking  the  land 
had  built  a  shanty  for  us  to  stay  in  and  a  yard  to  keep 
the  cattle  in.  We  herded  the  cattle  until  late  in  the 
evening  and  turned  them  out  again  early  in  the  morn- 
ing.   They  got  no  feed  except  what  they  grazed. 

When  we  had  finished  breaking  here  we  went  to 
break  for  the  boss.  He  owned  one  hundred  and  sixty 
acres  two  miles  east  of  where  Mt.  Joy  is  now.  He 
started  me  off  ahead  with  three  yoke  of  oxen  hitched 
to  a  wagon  loaded  with  forty  green  white-oak  fence 
posts  and  fence  boards.  About  two  miles  from  home 
I  came  to  a  creek  —  Goose  Creek,  I  think  it  was  called. 
To  get  to  the  bridge  I  had  to  drive  around  a  little  curve. 
The  bridge  had  been  built  just  a  short  time  and  the 
38 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  HAUBERG 

road  leading  up  to  it  graded.  It  had  rained  quite  hard 
the  night  before,  and  I  had  hard  work  keeping  the  oxen 
and  the  wagon  in  the  road.  The  creek  was  full  of 
water.  I  got  on  the  bridge  all  right,  but  a  little  too 
much  to  one  side  —  the  planks  were  not  nailed  down  — 
and  when  all  four  wheels  got  on  the  bridge  the  whole 
load,  wagon  and  all,  went  over  in  the  creek,  the  planks 
on  top  of  the  wagon. 

I  had  been  there  about  ten  minutes  when  a  man  driv- 
ing a  team  of  horses  came  from  the  north.  The  man 
got  off  and  came  to  where  I  was. 

"Sonny,  you  missed  the  bridge,  did  you?"  he  said. 

"I  did  not  miss  the  bridge,"  I  said,  "but  some  fools 
put  in  the  bridge  and  did  not  know  enough  to  nail  the 
planks  down." 

"Well,"  he  said,  "I  helped  to  put  in  the  bridge  and 
put  on  the  planks,  but  we  did  not  have  any  spikes.  I 
was  going  to  town  to  get  some  to  nail  them  down. 
Where  are  you  going  with  the  posts  and  fence  boards?" 

"I  don't  know;  the  boss  will  be  along  soon." 

"Who  is  your  boss?"  he  said.  I  told  him  Mr.  Rohif 
was  the  boss. 

"Aren't  you  pretty  young  to  send  out  with  a  load 
like  this?    How  old  are  you?" 

"Twelve  years.  I  guess  I  am  not  too  young,"  I  said. 
"You  had  better  stay  and  help  me  out." 

Just  then  the  boss  came  around  the  corner.  "What's 
the  matter?"  he  said. 

"No  matter  at  all,"  I  said;  "it's  all  water." 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  HAVBERG 

"Are  you  from  town?"  the  man  said.  I  said,  "Yes, 
I  am  from  town."  "I  thought  so,"  he  said.  I  did  not 
know  why  he  asked  me  that  question.  The  man  was  a 
brother  of  Henry  Saddoris,  of  Coe  Town.  I  met  him 
quite  often  after  I  grew  up.  He  used  to  remind  me  of 
the  affair  and  would  have  a  good  laugh. 

The  next  morning  we  fished  the  wagon,  fence  boards 
and  fence  posts  out  of  the  creek.  Two  young  men  by 
the  name  of  Petersen  helped  us.  Then  we  started  for 
the  ranch,  about  five  miles  out.  The  nearest  house  was 
a  mile  and  a  half  away. 

We  had  another  creek  to  cross,  near  where  Rohlf's 
farm  was,  but  there  was  no  bridge.  We  unloaded  half 
of  our  load  and  spaded  down  the  banks  of  the  creek, 
as  they  were  pretty  steep,  and  forded  it.  This  was 
about  forty  rods  from  our  camping  place.  We  camped 
on  a  little  knoll.  When  we  got  there  we  ate  our  dinner. 
After  dinner  I  dug  post  holes ;  but  before  I  started  to 
dig  post  holes  I  mowed  grass,  so  it  would  get  dry  be- 
fore bedtime.  The  boss  hauled  up  the  posts  and  boards. 
We  had  to  build  a  yard  before  night  to  keep  the  cattle 
in.    If  we  left  them  out,  they  would  stray  away. 

In  the  evening  we  put  the  dry  grass  in  the  wagon  box 
for  bedding,  put  a  blanket  over  it  and  a  blanket  for 
cover,  and  set  boards  up  against  the  wagon  box  to 
lean  over  us  in  bed  to  keep  the  dew  off.  The  boss  slept 
with  his  head  in  one  end  of  the  box  and  I  in  the  other. 
It  was  all  right  the  first  night,  but  after  that  the  snakes 
would  crawl  up  on  the  wagon  wheels  and  get  in  between 

40 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX   I).  HAVBERG 

our  blankets.  The  boss  was  as  afraid  of  a  snake  as 
death.  I  had  quite  a  lot  of  fun  with  him.  He  would 
go  to  bed  early  and  I  had  to  herd  the  cattle  until  about 
ten  o'clock,  and  then  drive  them  in  the  yard ;  but  before 
I  would  go  away  I  had  to  throw  out  the  snakes,  and 
once  in  a  while  they  would  fly  the  wrong  way  and  hit 
him  in  the  face. 

From  where  we  camped  you  could  look  northeast, 
north  and  northwest  and  not  see  a  house  nor  a  tree.  The 
last  two  deer  I  saw  in  Iowa  were  about  thirty  rods  west 
of  our  camp,  running  up  the  slough. 

We  broke  land  there  about  four  weeks,  five  days  a 
week.  We  would  drive  home  Friday  evenings  and  go 
to  Davenport  and  have  the  plow-shares  sharpened. 
One  Saturday  I  caught  a  ride  with  Nicholas  J.  Rusch. 
He  was  afterward  a  Colonel  in  the  Civil  War  and  Lieut- 
Governor  of  Iowa.  At  that  time  he  was  a  typical 
German,  and  smoked  his  long-stemmed  pipe  as  he 
drove  along.  The  pipe-bowl  was  of  porcelain  and  had 
pictures  painted  on  it.  While  we  were  in  Davenport 
a  hard  rain  came  up,  and  I  caught  a  ride  back  with  a 
man  by  the  name  of  Claus  Hast.  He  was  a  big,  heavy 
man  from  the  Probstei  in  Germany.  He  had  a  home- 
made wagon.  The  wheels  were  sawed  off  a  log,  and 
he  had  a  new  Wagon-bed  which  was  water-tight.  It 
had  rained  so  hard  that  the  creek  was  overflowing,  and 
when  he  drove  in  to  ford  across,  the  wagon-bed  floated 
off  the  bolsters  and  started  to  float  down  stream  with 
us.     He  called  "Whoa"  to  the  oxen  and  they  stopped, 

41 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  TIM  BERG 

and  after  we  had  floated  a  little  ways  we  caught  hold 
of  some  willows  and  pulled  ourselves  in  to  land. 

The  second  Monday  that  we  went  to  the  Rohlf  farm 
we  took  some  young  ash  trees  with  us,  and  I  set  them 
out.  They  are  still  there  and  are  big  trees  now.  I  was 
out  there  last  summer  and  we  took  pictures  of  them. 
The  farm  is  in  the  southwest  quarter  of  Section  29  in 
Lincoln  Township. 

There  were  two  boys  from  Davenport  working  in 
the  neighborhood,  driving  oxen  to  a  breaking  plow, 
and  we  would  visit  together  on  Sundays  and  catch 
snakes.  We  were  all  barefooted.  We  would  catch  all 
kinds  of  snakes.  If  we  could  not  find  a  stick  to  kill 
them  with  we  would  jump  on  their  heads  and  take  our 
knives  and  cut  their  heads  off.  We  would  see  how  long 
their  teeth  were  and  where  the  poison  was.  The  rattle- 
snake's poison  is  above  the  upper  jaw,  back  of  the  eye, 
on  the  side  of  the  head. 

We  thought  first  the  snakes  had  young  ones,  but 
this  is  not  so.  They  lay  eggs  in  the  ground  and  the  sun 
hatches  them.  The  snake  has  a  pouch  in  which  he  car- 
ries the  little  fellows.  I  have  counted  as  many  as  sixty- 
five  in  one  pouch.  A  snake  egg  is  the  shape  of  a 
pigeon's  egg  and  of  a  dirty  white  color.  We  would 
find  snake  eggs  in  the  ground  just  laid  and  some  ready 
to  hatch  and  hatching. 

The  latter  part  of  June  and  the  month  of  July  were 
pretty  dry  that  year.  We  had  five  yokes  of  oxen  pulling 
the  plow.     One  clay  it  was  very  hot,  and  it  was  hard 

42 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  HAVBERG 

work  to  get  the  oxen  to  pull.  The  boss  —  I  guess  he 
took  pity  on  me  —  said  he  would  drive  a  while  and  I 
could  look  after  the  plow;  so  we  changed  whips.  My 
whip  was  about  an  eight-foot  stock  and  ten-foot  lash, 
his  about  a  five-foot  stock  and  six-foot  lash,  which  he 
used  to  drive  the  hind  yoke.  We  had  not  gone  ten  rods 
when  the  oxen  turned  "gee"  on  him ;  he  followed  them 
up  and  the  lead  oxen  jumped  over  the  chain,  ahead  of 
the  second  yoke  from  the  rear.  The  chain  caught  on 
the  yoke  of  the  "off"  ox  and  pulled  him  down.  The 
boss  followed  them  up  and  whipped  them.  I  shouted 
to  him,  "Hold  on!  You  are  killing  my  ox!"  He  did 
not  stop  and  I  hit  him  over  the  head  with  my  whip 
stock.  I  backed  up  the  oxen  and  got  the  chain  loose 
in  time  to  save  the  ox ;  but  it  was  some  time  before  he 
was  able  to  get  up.  The  boss  stood  back  and  looked  on. 
When  the  ox  got  up  he  had  a  smile  on  his  face.  I  guess 
he  thought  I  did  the  right  thing. 

The  following  Monday  morning,  when  we  were  ready 
to  start,  Mrs.  Rohlf  said  to  me,  very  nicely,  "Marx,  be 
careful  not  to  hurt  Mr.  Rohlf  too  much."  I  felt  kind  of 
cheap. 

The  next  Saturday,  when  I  took  the  plow-shares  to 
town,  Mrs.  Rohlf  came  with  me.  She  would  rather 
ride  with  me.  We  had  to  walk  most  of  the  time  in 
driving  oxen  and  Mr.  Rohlf  did  not  like  to  walk.  I  got 
the  plow-shares  sharpened  and  Mrs.  Rohlf  did  her 
trading,  and  we  started  home.  Everything  went  all 
right  until  we  got  on  top  of  the  hill,  on  Brady  Street, 

42 


MEMOIRS  OF    1/  l/.'.V   /'.  II  1 1  BERG 

when  she  said,  "Get  in  the  wagon  and  ride,"  and  I  did. 
It  was  down  hill,  almost  a  half  mile,  to  the  Duck  Creek 
bridge.  "Let  the  oxen  trot  a  little,"  she  said,  and  I  let 
them  trot.  We  had  not  gone  far  when  the  key  came 
out  of  the  off  ox's  bow  and  the  bow  dropped  out  of  the 
yoke.  When  the  ox  was  loose  from  the  yoke  it  got  out 
of  the  way.  Then  the  near  ox  got  wild  and  ran  as  fast 
as  it  could.  I  got  out  over  the  dashboard  as  quickly  as 
I  could  and  took  out  the  wagon  hammer  to  loosen  the 
chain.  I  got  it  loose,  but  it  caught  in  the  eye  of  the 
hold-back  at  the  end  of  the  tongue.  Going  down  hill, 
as  we  were,  the  ox  loose  from  the  tongue,  sometimes 
the  ox  wmild  be  ahead  of  the  wagon  and  sometimes  the 
wagon  ahead  of  the  ox.  There  was  one  bridge  half- 
wax  down  the  hill  —  we  missed  that.  I  ran  for  dear 
life  to  unhook  the  chain  from  the  tongue  before  we 
should  get  to  I  Mick  Creek  bridge.  I  got  it  unhooked 
about  eight  rods  from  the  creek,  but  the  wagon  did  not 
stop  until  within  a  rod  or  two  of  the  creek.  The  ox 
went  down  the  bank,  which  was  eight  feet  high,  into 
the  creek.  Mrs.  Rohlf,  sitting  on  a  seat  board  on  the 
wagon,  looked  like  a  dead  woman.  1  told  her  to  get  off 
the  wagon  and  watch  the  ox,  so  it  would  not  go  home, 
while  I  went  back  to  look  for  the  other  one.  It  stood 
where  we  had  left  it,  a  third  of  a  mile  back.  When  I 
returned  I  went  down  in  the  creek  and  unyoked  the  ox 
and  drove  it  out ;  then  I  yoked  them  up  again,  hitched 
them  to  the  wagon  and  told  Mrs.  Rohlf  to  get  in. 
"I'll  walk,"  she  said. 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  HAL  BERG 

"Get  in,"  I  said;  "it  will  be  all  right.  They  will  not 
run  away  again."  She  got  in  and  we  got  home  all  right. 

About  thirty-five  years  after  that,  when  I  was  a  can- 
didate for  State  Senator,  I  met  Mr.  Rohlf  in  Daven- 
port. He  was  then  County  Treasurer  of  Scott  County. 
He  had  been  a  member  of  the  State  Legislature,  and 
he  insisted  on  me  going  home  with  him.  He  said,  "The 
Mrs.  is  talking  about  you  yet,  Catrina  is  still  with  us, 
and  they  will  be  glad  to  see  you."  Catrina  was  the 
servant  they  had  brought  with  them  from  Germany, 
and  stayed  with  the  Rohlfs  till  she  died ;  she  was  the 
maid  who  showed  me  where  to  sleep  the  first  night  I 
came  to  the  farm,  and  wrapped  up  my  big  toe  when  the 
rat  bit  me.  I  went  with  him.  When  we  got  there  both 
Mrs.  Rohlf  and  Catrina  knew  me. 

"I  didn't  think  you  would  know  me,"  I  said. 

"I  will  know  you  until  I  die,"  said  Mrs.  Rohlf.  "Why, 
Marx,  sometimes  I  would  think  you  were  a  little  rascal 
and  sometimes  I  thought  you  were  a  real  little  gentle- 
man. To  think,  now,  a  boy  twelve  years  old,  who  did 
what  you  did ;  it  doesn't  seem  possible.  If  it  had  been 
anybody  else  but  you,  I  would  have  been  dead  now;  I 
dream  about  it  yet  sometimes.  Do  you  remember  when 
that  ox  ran  away  with  us?  I  think  now  it  would  be 
impossible  for  anyone  to  do  what  you  did  —  you  saved 
my  life.  Why,  Marx,  I  never  thought  you  would  get 
so  big;  you  were  short  and  fat  when  you  worked  for 
us." 

I  stayed  there  all  night.  We  talked  until  after  mid- 
45 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX   D.  JIM  BERG 

night.  She  reminded  me  of  the  time  I  hit  her  husband 
over  the  head  with  the  whip-stock.  "But,  I  guess  it 
was  all  right,"  she  said.  "You  know  he  did  not  know 
anything  about  oxen." 

"I  felt  sorry  for  you,"  she  said,  "when  the  man  stuck 
the  fork  through  your  hand ;  you  told  him  you  would 
pay  him  for  that  when  you  got  big  enough.  Did  you 
ever  see  him  again?"  I  saw  him  when  I  was  nineteen 
years  old  —  and  paid  him. 

We  broke  prairie  till  harvest  time.  During  harvest 
I  helped  shock,  and  carried  water  and  the  bottle.  While 
stacking,  I  loaded  the  bundles,  the  boss  pitched  off  onto 
the  stack,  and  I  threw  the  bundles  to  the  stacker. 
When  the  stack  got  high  the  stacker  and  I  changed 
places  and  he  would  get  on  the  wagon  and  pitch  up  to 
me  and  I  piled  them  on  the  stack.  I  missed  catching 
one,  and  in  a  rage  he  struck  me  through  the  hand  with 
the  fork.     I  have  the  scar  in  my  hand  yet. 

We  boys  would  go  to  Davenport  some  Sundays  and 
trap  quails  and  snare  rabbits  in  the  woods,  where  the 
St.  James  hotel  now  stands. 

I  left  Mr.  Rohlf  about  November  first.  He  gave  me 
a  note  for  what  was  coming  to  me  at  ten  per  cent, 
interest. 

During  the  summer  I  visited  my  brother,  Dave,  twice 
on  Sundays.  The  last  time  I  was  there  they  were  haul- 
ing hay.  Dave  looked  pale  and  forlorn.  I  asked  him 
if  he  was  sick.  Tears  came  into  his  eyes  and  I  then 
noticed  a  drop  of  blood  on  each  ear.  His  boss  was  there. 

46 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX   I).  HAUBERG 

I  asked  him  if  he  had  been  pinching  his  ears.  He  did 
not  answer  right  away,  and  I  guess  I  got  mad;  I 
grabbed  a  fork  and  was  going  to  stick  him  with  it, 
when  father  came  around  the  stack  in  time  to  catch  it. 
I  told  father  he'd  better  take  him  home  with  him  —  if 
he  didn't,  I  would  —  and  find  another  place  for  him. 
Father  took  him  home.  The  remainder  of  the  season 
he  worked  for  Bill  Brooks  at  Brooks'  Crossing,  now 
42d  Street  and  5th  Avenue,  Rock  Island. 

When  I  came  home  I  worked  two  weeks  picking  corn. 
I  think  it  was  on  the  farm  where  John  Weckel  now 
lives,  on  7th  Street,  Moline,  next  south  of  25th  Avenue. 
When  I  quit,  the  man  gave  me  a  heifer  calf  for  my 
work.  Then  I  picked  corn  three  weeks  for  a  man  on 
Rock  River  bottoms.  He  gave  me  a  steer  calf  when 
I  quit,  and  a  rope  to  lead  it  home.    Some  fun ! 

Then  I  went  to  school  in  the  brick  building  on  the 
west  side  of  16th  Street,  between  4th  and  5th  Avenues, 
afterwards  the  City  Hall.  I  paid  for  two  months.  The 
first  week  everything  went  well.  The  second  week  I 
had  two  fights,  and  the  teacher  told  me  I  had  better 
pick  up  my  books  and  go  home.  He  handed  me  the 
money  that  was  coming  to  me.  I  did  not  even  have  to 
ask  for  it. 

Then  father  took  contracts  cutting  stove  wood,  at 
so  much  a  pile.  The  first  job  was  for  George  Stephens, 
afterwards  the  Moline  Plow  Company  man.  They  had 
three  little  children.  I  carried  my  dinner  with  me  and 
set  it  by  the  wood  pile.    Mrs.  Stephens  would  come  and 

47 


MEMOIRS  OF  1IARX  D.  HAUBERG 

take  it  into  the  house  to  keep  it  warm.  Sometimes  the 
little  folks  would  get  at  it  and  eat  what  they  liked,  and 
then  Mrs.  Stephens  would  give  me  my  dinner. 

The  next  job  father  had  was  for  Jonathan  Huntoon. 
When  that  was  done  I  went  to  work  on  a  farm  about 
seven  miles  northeast  of  Davenport,  where  father  had 
hired  me  out  to  John  and  Fritz  Priest  for  $5.00  per 
month.  I  went  there  about  March  1st  and  stayed  there 
until  about  October  1st,  when  I  quit  —  or  ran  away. 
I  thought  they  were  imposing  on  me.  They  had  four 
horses  and  a  hired  man,  besides  myself.  We  worked 
the  horses.  I  was  too  little  to  harness  or  unharness 
the  horses  —  they  had  big  horses  —  but  I  had  to  feed 
them  hay.  I  had  two  cows  to  milk  and  the  hogs  to 
feed  and  water.  I  had  to  carry  water  from  a  creek 
about  eight  rods  away,  and  had  to  pull  weeds  for  them 
in  summer.  They  had  seven  hogs  when  I  came  and 
thirty-five  when  I  left.  I  had  to  bring  a  pail  of  water 
from  the  creek  for  the  house  when  I  came  in  to  supper. 
When  the  weeds  got  dry  I  had  to  cut  corn  to  feed  the 
hogs  and  carry  it  ten  or  twelve  rods.  When  I  had 
milked  the  cows  we  ate  supper.  After  supper  I  had 
the  hogs  to  feed ;  and  the  other  fellows  sat  down  and 
smoked  their  pipes.  Sometimes  they  had  all  gone  to 
bed  when  I  got  through.  I  slept  with  the  hired  man. 
The  evenings  were  getting  kind  of  cool  —  I  went  bare- 
foot all  the  time  —  and  when  I  was  ready  to  go  to  bed 
he  would  have  the  bed  nice  and  warm,  and  his  feet  too. 


48 


MEMOIR'S  OF  MARX  D.  JIM  HERO 

I  would  stick  my  feet  in  a  warm  place  on  his  and  then 
he  would  kick. 

One  of  the  bosses,  John,  had  sold  a  horse  in  Daven- 
port and  before  delivering  it  he  was  going  to  take  off 
its  shoes,  and  he  wanted  me  to  hold  up  its  foot  while 
he  took  off  the  shoe.  I  told  him  he  had  better  take  the 
clinch  out  of  the  nails  first. 

"You  hold  up  the  foot,"  he  said.  I  did,  and  he  jerked 
it  away  from  me. 

"Take  hold  again." 

I  said,  "No,  you  hold  it ;  I  can  pull  as  much  as  you 
can."  So  he  held  up  the  foot  and  I  got  a  hold  of  the 
shoe  with  the  tongs  and  gave  it  a  jerk.  He  let  the  foot 
go  and  fell  down. 

"You  take  up  the  foot,"  he  said. 

I  said,  "No,  I  won't  do  it." 

"If  you  don't,  I'll  box  your  ears,"  he  said.  I  picked 
up  the  hammer  and  told  him  to  come  on.  He  didn't 
come.  He  got  on  his  horse  and  went  to  Davenport  and 
I  picked  up  my  clothes  and  went  to  Moline. 

On  my  way  home  I  met  Mr.  Griffin  from  Coaltown, 
and  hired  out  to  him  for  $7.00  a  month,  hauling  coal 
to  Hampton  and  Rock  Island  with  oxen.  He  paid  me 
in  money.  After  that  I  hired  out  on  the  other  side  of 
Rock  River  to  pick  corn,  for  fifty  cents  a  day.  I  got  a 
pig  and  a  calf  for  my  work. 

When  I  got  home  Henry  Frels  of  Hampton  Bluff  was 
there  and  wanted  somebody  to  pick  corn.  I  went  with 
him.     He  had  two  other  men,  besides  himself.     There 

49 
Memoirs.     4. 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX'D.  HAUBERG 

is  where  I  got  initiated  in  sleeping  upstairs  in  a  log 
house.  Daniel  Holmes  and  I  slept  upstairs.  One  night 
we  had  a  big  snow  storm  and  when  we  awoke  the  next 
morning  there  was  about  six  inches  of  snow  on  the  bed 
and  the  floor.  We  did  not  wear  underwear  those  days 
and  when  we  undressed  we  threw  our  pants  on  the 
floor.  When  we  put  our  feet  down  that  morning  to 
put  on  our  pants,  it  felt  kind  of  ticklish.  This  was 
Monday  morning.  We  picked  corn  that  day.  The  next 
morning  it  was  too  cold  to  pick  corn  and  Mr.  Frels 
said  to  me,  "You  can  go  to  school,"  and  I  did.  Mr. 
Frels  had  two  children  going  to  school  —  Fred,  nine 
years  old,  and  Margaret,  six  years  old. 

I  went  to  school  that  week,  in  Cook's  log  school 
house.  After  school  Friday  evening  the  boys  had  to 
try  my  mettle;  that  was  customary  all  over  the  coun- 
try. When  a  new  boy  came  they  had  to  try  him.  I 
told  Fred  not  to  say  anything  about  it  to  the  folks; 
but  when  Margaret  got  home  she  said,  "Mother,  our 
boy  had  a  fight."  The  next  day,  Saturday,  Mr.  Frels 
took  me  back  to  Moline. 

This  log  school  was  on  Harris  Cook's  land,  on  the 
north  side  of  the  Bluff  road,  a  few  yards  west  of  where 
the  road  turns  southward  to  Barstow.  (In  the  north- 
east quarter  of  Section  23,  Hampton  Township.) 

It  being  near  Christmas,  I  did  not  do  anything  until 
after  New  Year's.  Then  I  went  to  school  in  Moline. 
I  paid  for  two  months.  I  got  along  fine  with  the  boys, 
but  I  thought  the  teacher  did  not  know  much.    He  had 

50 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  I).  HAVBERG 

me  write  copies  in  the  copy  books  for  the  other  pupils. 
The  school  was  kept  in  a  small  upstairs  room,  and  I 
had  to  go  out  in  the  hall  and  spread  the  paper  on  the 
floor  to  write  the  copies.  The  weather  got  so  cold  the 
ink  would  freeze  on  my  pen  —  there  was  no  stove,  and 
I  would  put  the  pen  in  my  mouth  to  thaw  the  ink. 

I  got  tired  of  that,  so  I  thought  I  would  find  out  how 
much  the  teacher  knew.  I  looked  up  some  hard  words 
to  pronounce  and  asked  him  to  pronounce  them  for  me. 
He  did.  I  thanked  him,  then  I  told  him  how  I  pro- 
nounced them.  He  said,  "Come  back  and  let  me  see." 
He  spelled  them  over  again  and  said,  "That's  right, 
and  you  knew  that  before  you  came  here."  I  did  not 
want  to  crawfish,  so  I  told  him  I  did ;  that  I  just  wanted 
to  know  whether  he  did.  "Well,  Marx,"  he  said,  "I'm 
sorry,  but  you  might  just  as  well  quit,"  and  I  did.  This 
was  in  the  winter  of  1851 — 2.  The  school  was  in  the 
brick  house  which  is  still  standing:  No.  714  Fourteenth 
Street,  Moline.  It  was  the  Michael  J.  Hartzell  resi- 
dence. 

Next  I  went  to  work  for  John  Deere  for  twenty-five 
cents  a  day,  and  boarded  myself,  squaring  plow-beams 
and  sawing  them  off  with  a  buck  saw,  and  bending  the 
plow  handles.  I  had  a  big  iron  kettle  out  doors  filled 
with  water  into  which  I  put  the  handles  and  cooked 
them,  then  bent  them  over  a  log.  I  tied  the  other  end 
down,  according  to  how  much  of  a  curve  was  wanted 
in  them.  While  I  worked  there  a  German  by  the  name 
of  Mr.  Dunker  was  killed.    He  was  a  grinder  and  got 

51 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX   D.  HAUBERG 

his  foot  entangled  in  a  belt.  John  Deere,  a  Mr.  Wil- 
liams, and  a  young  man  and  myself  were  there  when 
it  happened.  The  young  man  was  drilling  holes  in 
shares  and  mouldboards.  I  found  many  years  later 
that  this  young  man  was  William  Jackson,  the  lawyer, 
of  Rock  Island.  John  Deere's  establishment  at  that 
time  was  a  one-story  shop,  with  three  fires  or  forges. 

I  worked  for  John  Deere  until  March  1st,  and  on 
March  14th  I  went  to  work  on  a  farm  one  mile  from 
the  river,  across  from  Moline,  belonging  to  John  Littig, 
to  whom  father  had  hired  me  out  for  six  dollars  a 
month  for  eight  months.  I  got  there  in  the  evening. 
I  told  him  who  I  was.  "Well,  you  can  stay  all  night," 
he  said,  "and  in  the  morning  you  can  go  back  to  Moline 
and  stay  two  weeks  and  then  come  back.  The  ground 
is  too  wet  to  work,  and  if  it  keeps  on  raining,  you  can 
stay  home  longer." 

"I  want  to  go  to  work  and  earn  some  money,"  I  said. 

"I  can  clo  all  the  work  I  have  to  do  myself,  until  we 
get  into  the  field,"  he  said.  Both  Mr.  Littig  and  his 
wife  worked  in  the  field.  They  were  hard  workers. 
She  would  leave  the  field  a  little  while  before  meal 
time,  and  get  the  meal  ready. 

I  left  the  next  morning  and  took  my  duds  along,  and 
hired  out  to  Fielding  Madison  for  three  months  at 
eight  dollars  a  month  where  Bettendorf  is  now.  Our 
nearest  neighbor  was  Isaac  Morgan,  who  lived  in  a 
brick  house  a  half  mile  down  the  river.    I  got  acquaint- 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX   D.  HAl  BERG 

ed  with  his  son,  James  W.  Morgan,  who  afterwards 
located  in  Port  Byron,  and  later  in  Moline,  as  a  doctor. 

Our  next  nearest  neighbor  lived  three-quarters  of  a 
mile  up  the  river.  They  were  the  Eph.  Stokes',  a  broth- 
er of  Young  Stokes  who  built  the  dam  and  flour  mill 
at  Cleveland,  on  Rock  River. 

Mr.  Madison  had  rented  twenty  acres  of  land  from 
Mr.  Gilbert  (of  the  Pitts,  Gilbert  &  Pitts  of  Moline) 
for  corn.  While  I  plowed  that  land  I  saw  the  biggest 
snake  I  have  ever  seen  running  loose.  I  think  it  was 
ten  feet  long.     It  frightened  my  horses. 

Mr.  Madison  planted  twenty  acres  in  corn  and  five 
acres  in  onions.  He  had  a  little  store  where  he  sold 
groceries,  patent  medicines,  also  soft  drinks  with  a  kick 
in  them.  We  made  our  own  drinks.  I  think  we  took 
wheat  bran,  a  little  brown  sugar,  and  soft  water,  a 
little  yeast;  then  let  it  stand  and  work.  Afterwards 
we  added  a  little  alcohol.  Our  drink  beat  anything 
they  had  in  Davenport.  On  rainy  days,  farmers  would 
come  from  all  directions.  We  had  foot  races,  horse ^ 
races,  wrestling  matches,  and  fighting.  Everybody 
went  home  happy.  I  got  about  all  the  bar  tending  I 
wanted  in  a  place  like  that  without  police  protection. 
He  kept  a  row-boat  to  ferry  people  over  to  and  from 
Moline,  and  I  ran  that  part  of  the  time. 

When  I  quit  working  for  Mr.  Madison,  I  got  a  job 
at  Spencer  H.  White's  saw  mill  for  fifty  cents  a  day. 
White's  mill  was  next  to  the  Island,  at  the  north  end 
of  the  brush  dam  at  Moline.     Chamberlain  &  Dean's 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  HAVBERO 

saw  mill  was  in  mid-stream  on  the  dam,  next  south  of 
White's.  The  dam  between  them  was  being  repaired. 
I  carried  my  dinner  with  me,  and,  after  eating,  would 
fish  from  the  dam.  One  day  during  the  noon  hour 
three  men  came  to  inspect  the  work,  when  all  of  a 
sudden  the  dam  broke,  and  they  were  caught  by  the 
water.  It  missed  me  by  about  a  foot.  One  of  the  three 
men  swam  ashore;  one  man  got  hold  of  the  end  of  a 
log;  and  the  third  man,  I  think,  was  drowned.  I  did 
not  see  him  again.  The  other  two  men  were  D.  B. 
Sears  and  John  W.  Spencer. 

After  I  quit  the  saw  mill,  I  worked  for  Abram  Frick, 
at  Frick's  hill,  for  fifty  cents  a  day,  picking  apples, 
digging  potatoes  and  picking  corn.  I  got  a  linchpin 
wagon  for  my  pay.  I  also  picked  apples  for  Bill  Brooks 
for  a  couple  of  weeks  for  fifty  cents  a  day.  His  orchard 
was  southwest  of  his  house,  now  4106  Fifth  Avenue, 
Rock  Island,  111.,  and  everything  east  of  it  was  woods 
of  mostly  oak  and  walnut,  more  walnut  than  oak ;  and 
the  public  road  passed  among  the  trees.  To  the  west 
between  his  place  and  Rock  Island  was  also  timbered. 

Back  of  where  the  Moline  Wagon  Company  is  now 
was  a  log  house  with  a  rail  fence  around  it  on  which 
they  generally  had  gourd  vines.  They  would  have  their 
cows  laying  out  in  the  road  at  night,  out  in  front  of  the 
house.  The  public  road  passed  between  the  house  and 
the  river  near  the  edge  of  the  river,  and  back  of  the 
house  was  quite  a  rise  of  ground. 

East  of  Twentieth  Street,  Moline,  at  the  foot  of  the 
54 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  HAVBERG 

bluff,  was  a  corn  field.  One  winter  they  did  not  get 
the  corn  out.  The  snow  got  too  deep  for  them,  and 
the  wild  turkeys  came  out  of  the  woods  on  the  bluff  to 
feed  in  the  corn  field.  A  good  many  wild  turkeys  were 
shot  there  that  winter,  and  also  a  deer.  I  think  it  was 
a  Mr.  Collins  that  shot  the  deer. 

While  we  lived  in  Moline  I  very  often  visited  at  my 
Aunt's  on  the  Island  to  play  with  my  cousin  Katie  Liitt, 
and  with  the  children  of  Col.  Davenport,  Henry  and 
Lizzie.  They  were  very  dark.  It  was  claimed 
they  were  part  Indian.  My  aunt  died  and  was 
buried  in  the  old  Moline  cemetery.  My  cousin  Katie 
married  a  man  by  the  name  of  Lamp.  I  think  they 
moved  to  Dayton,  0.  The  Liitts  now  living  in  Rock 
Island  are  of  the  second  wife  and  not  related.  Lizzie 
Davenport  married  a  man  by  the  name  of  Ferkel,  and 
they  moved  on  a  farm  in  the  lower  end  of  the  county. 

The  first  time  I  saw  Bailey  Davenport  he  was  wear- 
ing a  plug  hat  and  was  quite  a  young  man.  He  was 
always  a  friend  of  mine  and  supported  me  years  after- 
wards when  I  was  in  politics. 

Antoine  LeClaire  used  to  call  at  the  Davenport 
house  on  the  Island  when  I  would  be  there.  I  can  see 
him  yet,  plain  as  day.  He  was  not  as  tall  as  Bailey 
Davenport.  He  was  dark  complexioned,  kind  of  red 
face,  and  fat.  He  was  just  square  up  and  down,  just 
as  wide  at  the  hips  as  at  his  shoulders,  and  full  in  be- 
tween. He  filled  the  full  width  of  the  seat  in  the  boat. 
Henry  Davenport  and  I  rowed  him  across  to  Davenport 


MEMOIRS  OF  MANX  D.  HAUBERG 


one  time,  and  I  rowed 
him  over  alone  one  time. 
When  he  built  the  Le- 
Claire  House  in  Daven- 
port it  was  considered 
a  big  building.  Some- 
thing wonderful. 

Old  Fort  Armstrong 
at  this  time  was  all  di- 
lapidated. We  used  to 
play  over  the  ruins  and 
climbed  down  the  rocks 
to  the  caves.  There  were 
three   towers   or  block- 

\\  rOINE    I.K   CLAIRE, 
Indian   interpreter,   and    one   of   the   Founders    houses,     and     a     kind     of 
of  Davenport,    l>>\\a. 

high  cellar  of  masonry. 
That  was  the  magazine.  Nobody  seemed  to  be  looking 
after  the  old  fort  at  that  time.  East  of  the  Fort  was  a 
wide,  cleared  space  or  prairie.  I  used  to  wonder  why 
that  was  open  ground  and  all  the  rest  timber.  I  de- 
cided it  must  have  been  cleared  by  the  soldiers  so  they 
could  not  be  surprised  by  the  Indians. 

The  island  had  fine  pasturage.  A  hundred  or  more 
cattle  were  pastured  there  through  the  summer. 
Everybody  in  Moline  had  a  cow  and  a  pig  or  a  half 
a  dozen  of  them.  The  cattle  were  driven  to  the  island 
over  the  brush  dam.  One  time  father  took  some  of 
our  cattle  over  by  swimming  them  over  the  slough. 
He  carried  a  small  calf  in  the  boat.     The  cattle  gave 

56 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX   />.  HAl  BERG 

almost  no  trouble  on  the  island ;  we  had  only  one  calf 
swim  back  and  come  home.  There  is  hardly  a  foot 
of  ground  on  the  island  that  I  did  not  go  over,  looking 
after  cattle. 

The  Davenport  residence  was  the  best  around  here 


The  Col.    George   Davenport   homestead   on   Rock   Island,   to   which   I   was  a 
frequent   visitor. 

They  had  a  small  cottage  near  it  where  my  aunt  and 
uncle  lived.  The  Davenport  children  played  with  my 
cousin  Katie,  and  were  in  and  out  of  aunt's  house  so 
much  they  both  learned  to  talk  "platt-deutsch,"  and 
I  was  often  in  the  Davenport  house  and  had  many  a 
meal  there. 

In   1851,    immigrants    began    coming    to    Moline. 
Christian   Loptien   and  two   sons,   Christian   and   Jo- 

57 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  II  AT  HERO 

achim,  shoemakers,  came  that  year.  Also  Amos 
Schmidt  and  one  daughter,  and  two  young  men  by 
the  names  of  Hans  and  Claus  Langmaak.  In  the  fall 
of  1852  there  came  Hans  S.  Schodtfeldt  and  two 
little  daughters,  Mary,  now  Mrs.  Reimer  Reimers,  and 
Margaret,  now  Mrs.  Conrad  Grantz.  Also  Claus  Grilk 
and  little  daughter,  now  the  wife  of  Louis  Weckel,  a 
grocer  of  Rock  Island ;  and  James  First,  a  wagon 
maker,  and  originator  of  the  Moline  Wagon  Company, 
now  the  John  Deere  Wagon  Co.  Claus  Grilk  who  was 
a  blacksmith,  with  his  shop  at  Five  Points,  made  wa- 
gons also.  Matthias  Kahler  came  to  Moline  late  in 
the  fall  of  1852.  All  the  above-named,  for  most  part, 
came  during  the  summer  months,  at  different  times, 
and  staid  at  our  house  from  one  day  to  two  weeks, 
or  until  they  found  a  house  to  live  in. 

John  Nichols  was  in  Moline  when  we  came  there. 
They  had  a  little  daughter,  Mina,  about  three  months 
old.  She  was  the  first  German  girl  born  in  Moline. 
My  sister  Elizabeth  was  the  second.  Nichols  lived  in 
a  frame  house  that  stood  where  the  waterworks  is  now. 
Hans  Schlodtfeldt  and  Claus  Grilk  lived  just  below 
where  Dr.  P.  H.  Wessel  lives  now,  at  about  Eighth 
Avenue  and  Fifteenth  Street. 

Three  Swedish  families,  by  the  name  of  Benson, 
Johnson  and  Anderson,  also  came  in  fifty-two.  Ben- 
son was  the  grandfather  of  George  L.  Benson  the 
grocer. 

Henry  Andersen,  a  German,  married  an  Irish  girl. 

58 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  JIAVBERG 

Mrs.  Andersen,  his  mother,  who  was  a  widow,  lived 
neigbors  to  Mr.  Charley  Dibbern,  on  a  farm  North 
of  Davenport.  Here  they  had  target  shooting.  When 
I  worked  for  Mr.  Rohlf  they  invited  father  to  come. 
He  came.  They  had  a  two-room  house  and  that  night 
they  gave  a  dance.  The  fiddlers  fiddled  in  one  room 
and  they  danced  in  the  other.  At  that  time  there  was 
a  big  over-grown  fellow  in  Davenport.  Whenever 
there  were  any  doings  in  Davenport  he  would  go,  with- 
out an  invitation,  and  make  the  other  fellows  "set  'em 
up" ;  and  if  they  didn't  he  gave  them  a  pounding.  He 
domineered  everybody.  Everybody  was  afraid  of  him. 
He  was  here  too.  He  took  father  by  the  shoulders 
with  both  hands  and  bumped  his  head  on  the  door 
frame.     Father  asked  him  if  he  was  in  his  way. 

"You  don't  belong  here;  you  are  from  Illinois,"  the 
fellow  said. 

Father  said,  "I  was  invited." 

"You  get  back  over  the  river  or  I'll  make  mince- 
meat of  you." 

He  had  hardly  said  the  last  word  when  father 
knocked  him  down.  When  he  got  up,  father  asked 
him  why  he  had  bumped  his  head.  The  fellow  did 
not  answer  quickly  enough  and  father  knocked  him 
down  again.  He  just  about  did  the  fellow  up.  After 
that  almost  anyone  in  Davenport  could  put  it  over  him. 
He  had  to  leave  town.     He  was  cooked. 

In  1851  Father  bought  One-hundred-sixty  acres  of 
land  in  Coe  Township.     They  called  that  part  of  the 

59 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX   D.  If Al  BERG 

country  the  "High  Prairie."  It  was  in  section  twelve. 
He  bought  it  of  Elihu  B.  Washburne,  of  Galena,  111., 
and  paid  $255.00  for  it.  He  sold  the  East  eighty 
acres  of  it  to  Henry  Knock  for  $125.00  Then  father 
collected  the  money  standing  out  that  my  brother  Dave 
and  I  had  earned.  My  brother  Dave  worked  for  Wolf 
Hahn,  six  miles  west  of  Davenport,  in  1851,  for  four 
dollars  a  month.  In  1852  he  worked  for  him  eight 
months  at  five  dollars  per  month.  During  the  summers 
of  1851  and  1852  father  worked  for  William  McEniry, 
making  brick.  McEniry  was  the  first  brick-maker  in 
Moline.  He  was  the  father  of  John,  Matt  and  Mollie 
McEniry  of  Moline,  and  William  of  Rock  Island.  In 
the  winter,  father  cut  cordwood. 

In  the  winter  of  1852 — 3,  my  brother  and  I  cut 
stove  wood  and  attended  school  at  the  brick  building 
on  16th  St.,  afterwards  the  Moline  City  hall.  After 
that  father  took  jobs  all  over  town,  cutting  wood.  I 
sawed,  and  Dave  split.  I  guess  we  made  about  twenty 
dollars  for  our  winter's  work. 

In  the  spring  of  1853  we  moved  to  the  farm.  Du- 
ring the  winter  father  had  bought  a  yoke  of  oxen  for 
$45.00.  Henry  Knock  also  bought  a  yoke  of  oxen. 
About  the  middle  of  March  we  started  to  the  farm 
father  bought  of  Washburne,  to  build  a  log  house. 
There  were  four  of  us  that  went.  Henry  Knock  and 
his  hired  man,  Henry  Kahler,  six  months  younger  than 
I,  and  father  and  myself.  We  arrived  at  the  farm 
a  little  after  sundowm,  with  two  yoke  of  oxen.     There 

60 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX   1>.  HAUBERG 

were  about  Twenty  acres  of  timber  land  on  both  sides 
of  the  creek.  The  grove  was  called  "Sugar  Grove" 
and  the  creek  was  known  as  Sugar  Creek,  because  the 
timber  was  mostly  Sugar  Maple.  There  was  a  log 
house  in  the  grove  where  the  people  had  camped  when 
they  tapped  the  trees  and  boiled  sugar.  We  had  hay 
and  corn  with  us,  and  provisions  for  two  weeks.  I 
took  care  of  the  oxen  and  the  other  fellows  put  the 
house  in  order,  one  corner  of  which  had  been  knocked 
down,  so  we  could  get  in.  I  was  the  cook.  I  cooked 
coffee  and  baked  pancakes  for  supper.  The  next  mor- 
ning we  had  coffee,  eggs  and  pancakes  and  bread  and 
butter.  We  had  two  dogs  —  one  was  a  bloodhound 
and  the  other  a  kind  of  dachshund  which  we  had 
brought  from  Tennessee. 

After  breakfast  we  started  to  look  over  the  farm. 
We  had  not  gone  thirty  rods  when  the  dogs  chased 
up  a  deer.  We  had  not  gone  ten  rods  farther  when 
they  chased  up  two  more ;  and  when  we  got  up  the 
hill  east  of  where  our  house  stands  now,  they  chased 
out  another  deer. 

It  soon  became  known  that  we  were  in  Sugar  Grove. 
David  Martin,  a  boy  about  my  age,  went  to  Tom 
Walker,  his  cousin,  and  said,  "Tom,  they  say  some 
Dutch  have  moved  to  Sugar  Grove,  what  do  you  say 
we  go  over  there  tomorrow  and  see  what  they  look 
like?"  They  came.  It  being  Sunday,  we  did  not  work. 
We  were  in  the  house.  At  noontime  I  crawled  out  of 
the  house  to  feed  the  cattle.     They  saw  me.    Tom  said 

61 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  HAL' BERG 

to  Dave,  "I  don't  believe  he's  a  Dutchman,  he  looks 
just  like  we  do."  When  I  got  back  to  the  house  I  saw 
them  looking  over  the  hill.  I  called  to  them  to  come 
to  the  house.  They  came.  Father  got  out  the  bottle 
and  gave  them  a  drink.  After  that  the  Dutch  were 
all  right.  We  boys  got  quite  chummy.  We  often 
laughed  about  it  years  afterward  when  they  would  tell 
about  this. 

We  were  about  two  weeks  getting  the  material  ready 
for  the  house ;  then  I  went  back  to  Moline  to  get  pro- 
visions for  the  house-raising.  Isaiah  Marshall,  living 
two  miles  and  a  half,  and  Joe  Martin,  living  two  miles 
southeast  of  us,  had  been  over  to  see  us,  and  they  had 
invited  the  men  for  the  house-raising.  Everybody  in  the 
country  was  there.  Isaiah  Marshall  and  his  four  boys 
— Joe,  John,  William  and  Brice;  Joe  Martin  and  his 
three  boys  —  John,  James  and  Dave;  John  Walker 
and  his  son,  Tom;  Hiram  Walker  and  son,  Sam;  Hiram 
Cain ;  John  Marshall ;  Alec  Abbott ;  Tom  Fowler  and 
Thurlow  Garrison.  Some  of  them  brought  their  din- 
ners, but  I  got  dinner  for  all  of  them.  Everybody 
was  happy.  We  got  the  house  almost  finished  —  put 
on  the  rafters,  laid  the  floor  joists,  sawed  out  the  door 
and  windows.  They  used  no  nails,  just  pegs.  They 
got  all  the  whiskey  they  wanted  to  drink  and  nobody 
got  drunk ;  everybody  went  home  happy.  That  house- 
raising  created  a  friendship  that  lasted  as  long  as  they 
lived.     They  christened  father  "King  of  the  Dutch." 

We  built  the  log  house  about  ten  rods  north  of  Sugar 

62 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  I).  JIM  BERG 


The  Hauberg  log   cabin   at   Sugar   Grove,   1853. 

Creek,  on  the  rise  of  ground  there.  Just  west  was  a 
little  hill,  and  that  and  the  ground  all  the  way  from 
the  south,  southwest,  to  the  west  and  north  was  tim- 
ber with  big  trees  so  we  were  well  protected  from  the 
north  and  west  wind.  East  and  southeast  was  open 
ground  for  garden  and  orchard.  We  got  our  water  for 
cooking  and  drinking  from  a  spring  in  the  creek. 

The  other  fellows  cut  the  logs  and  I  snaked  them 
to  where  we  built  the  house.  We  split  the  rafters 
and  floor  joists  from  some  of  the  tall,  straight  Sugar 
Maple.  For  flooring  upstairs  and  downstairs  we  got 
oak  bords  from  a  saw  mill  at  Port  Byron  that  was  run 
by  Fred  Gates'  father.  The  boards  were  twelve  inches 
wide.  We  had  wooden  door-hinges,  a  ladder  to  go  up- 
stairs ;  a  wooden  doorlatch,  the  string  outside.  We 
had  no  lock,  and  the  log  house  in  all  its  days  was  never 

63 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  HAUBERG 

locked.  We  had  an  augur  hole  in  the  door-frame  and 
when  we  all  left  the  house  a  peg  was  stuck  into  the 
hole  to  keep  the  door  shut.  Our  house  was  14x18 
feet,  one  story  and  three  logs  high,  with  oak  split 
shingles  and  stove  pipe  sticking  through  the  roof.  We 
had  a  little  sumer  kitchen  lean-to  in  front,  west  of  the 
door. 

Ours  was  not  the  first  German  blood  on  the  High 
Prairie,  but  we  were  the  first  family  of  direct  German 
immigration  to  come  here.  The  Spaids,  Zieglers', 
Simpsons',  Garrisons',  Flickengers'  were  all  Pennsyl- 
vania folks  and  were  nice  people.  All  of  them  under- 
stood German.  Old  Mr.  David  Metzger  of  Port  Byron 
was  one  of  them.  Old  Mr.  Jacob  Flickenger  and  his 
wife  never  talked  plain  English.  The  northern  part 
of  the  township  and  Cordova  township  was  settled 
mostly  by  the  Jersey  people.  The  Marshalls',  Goldens', 
Quicks',  Ege's,  Cools,  and  Sextons',  and  the  Southern 
part  had  Ohio  people  and  came  from  about  the  same 
place.  They  were  the  "Colonel"  William  Johnson's,  Dil- 
lins',  Wards',  Genungs',  all  nice  people.  The  LaRue's 
were  from  New  York  State  and  were  a  different  style 
of  people  altogether,  a  different  class  of  people.  I 
think  it  was  all  in  the  neighborhood  that  they  came 
from  in  New  York. 

We  repaired  the  log  house  that  the  sugar-makers 
had  built ;  put  in  new  logs,  and  Mr.  Knock  moved  into 
that  the  same  spring. 

We  moved  to  the  farm  about  the  middle  of  April. 

04 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX    I).  11 M  BERQ 

The  furniture  and  family  were  in  a  wagon  drawn  by 
oxen.  Margaret,  the  youngest  of  the  family,  was  four 
months  old.  Among  the  furniture  was  a  couple  of 
chairs  we  had  brought  from  Tennessee.  They  were 
splint-bottomed,  high  backed,  the  bottom  being  of  split 
hickory.  Then  we  had  the  old  iron  kettle  and  long 
handled  skillet,  also  from  Tennessee,  and  a  stove  and 
other  things.  Father  made  all  the  other  furniture 
needed  in  the  home,  from  boards  and  timber,  such 
as  table  and  stools,  etc. 

We  had  two  yoke  of  oxen  of  our  own.  We  had  rais- 
ed 2  steer  calves,  now  3  years  old  and  well  broke.  We 
broke  them  when  they  were  yearlings  and  hauled  wood 
with  them  for  two  winters  for  our  own  use.  We  had 
3  cows  and  7  head  of  young  cattle,  three  sows,  and 
poultry.  We  drove  straight  through  across  lots  from 
where  Mike  Murphy  now  lives  (a  half  mile  east  of 
Fairfield  church)  to  where  John  Rocker  lives  (South 
line  of  southwest  quarter  section  ten,  Coe  township). 
We  got  stuck  in  the  mud  in  the  slough — now  Arista 
Saddoris'  field.  When  we  moved  up  here  it  was  seven 
miles  to  Port  Byron.  It  is  now  seven  and  a  half  miles 
because  now  we  have  got  to  follow  section  lines.  At 
that  time  we  drove  straight  across  the  country,  wher- 
ever the  way  looked  the  best  and  shortest. 

After  leaving  Port  Byron  the  first  house  was  Steel's 
where  John  Fife  now  lives.  Then  came  Flickenger's 
where  the  old  McRoberts'  place  is — now  Richard  Ash- 
down's  (next  south  of  Fairfield  cemetery)  ;  then  Rube 

65 

.!/•  moirs.     5. 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  HAVBERG 

Hollister's  father's  place  was  passed  and  then  Tom 
Fowler  where  Arista  Saddoris  now  is.  From  Jim 
McRoberts'  (one  fourth  mile  east  of  Fairfield)  to  the 
Garrison  place  (in  southwest  corner  of  section  ten)  the 
road  passed  over  virgin  prairie.  Garrison's  afterward 
built  the  house  which  now  is  occupied  by  the  Rocker's. 
Next  East  were  the  Larue's.  They  were  raising  their 
new  frame  house  the  day  we  moved  up  from  Moline. 
Nathaniel  Pearsall  owns  the  place  and  is  tearing  down 
the  house  now.  This  was  the  last  residence  we  passed 
on  the  way  to  our  log  house.  The  huners'  lodge  was 
off  to  our  right  (at  near  the  southwest  corner  of  the 
northwest  quarter  of  the  northeast  quarter  of  section 
fourteen)  but  was  unoccupied  except  in  the  season 
when  these  Philadelphia  men  came  to  hunt. 

Toward  the  north  was  the  house  of  the  George 
Marshall's.  Tunis  Quick  was  already  in  the  country 
and  living  at  the  old  "Cheese  House"  (in  east  half 
of  section  one,  Coe  township).  Wesley  Cain  built 
either  that  Spring  or  the  year  before,  a  log  house 
where  the  Cain  house  now  is  (in  southeast  quarter, 
section  twelve,  Coe)  and  on  to  the  east  there  was 
nothing  until  you  struck  the  bottoms  where  Volney 
Baker  lived  in  a  log  house,  (at  about  the  northeast 
corner  of  the  northwest  quarter  of  the  southeast  quar- 
ter of  section  eight,  Canoe  Creek  township).  Ed.  Ash- 
down  lived  there  afterwords. 

Isaiah  H.  Marshall,  a  lawyer  from  Pennsylvania  and 
who  later  lived  in  Virginia,  lived  in  a  log  house  at 
66 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX   I).  JIM  BERG 

about  the  middle  of  the  west  half  of  section  seventeen. 
Canoe  Creek  township.  He  came  in  1842  but  in  1854 
he  built  the  brick  house  that  my  brother  Dave  after- 
ward owned.  Joe  Martin,  a  heavy  set  man,  lived  in 
a  log  house,  opposite  where  Dave  Martin's  house  after- 
ward stood,  south  of  the  creek  at  about  the  center  of 
section  eighteen,  Canoe  Creek  township,  now  Willie 
Pearsall's ;  and  John  Walker  lived  in  a  log  house  on 
the  farm  now  owned  by  Alvin  Frels  (at  the  South- 
west corner  of  the  southeast  Quarter  of  section  eigh- 
teen, Canoe  Creek).  Martins  and  Walkers  came  here 
in  1836  and  were  from  Kentucky.  The  Quicks  and 
Cains  and  the  "Cordova"  Marshalls  and  the  "Prairie" 
Marshalls  were  all  from  the  same  locality  in  New 
Jersey. 

The  morning  after  we  got  here  brother  Dave  went 
to  work  for  Isaiah  Marshall  at  seven  dollars  a  month. 
Henry  Kahler  and  myself  started  to  break  prairie  on 
our  new  farm,  with  three  yoke  of  oxen.  He  drove  the 
oxen  and  I  tended  the  plow.  We  broke  prairie  until 
harvest  time.  Father  planted  corn  on  sod  the  first 
year.  The  second  year  he  wanted  to  sow  wheat  and 
I  got  wheat  for  pay  instead  of  money  from  "Billy  G" 
Marshall's.  Father  made  fence  rails  in  Martin's  grove, 
the  first  year,  from  down  timber,  but  not  all  our  fences 
were  built  of  rails.  We  made  ditch-and-bank  fences 
like  they  had  in  Holstein,  Germany,  where  we  came 
from.  We  would  dig  a  trench  about  two-and-a-half 
feet  deep  and  about  three  feet  wide.    The  sod  that  we 

07 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX   I).  HAUBERG 

dug  up  was  set  on  the  edge  next  to  the  trench  with 
another  row  of  sod  about  three  feet  from  it  and  be- 
tween these  two  rows  of  sod  we  threw  the  dirt  as  we 
dug  the  trench.  This  made  a  bank  about  five  or  six 
feet  high  from  the  bottom  of  the  trench.  If  the  sod 
grew  it  made  a  fence  that  lasted  a  long  time  and 
turned  cattle  or  anything.     If  the  bank  got  worn  or 


nil    day    remain 


'i   one   "i   "in    nld    Ditch-and-wal]   fences. 


washed  down  we  would  cut  wild  crabapple  or  other 
thorny  brush  and  lay  it  on  top  of  the  bank.  You  can 
still  see  about  two  miles  of  traces  of  these  old  ditch- 
and-bank  fences  on  our  farm  and  adjoining  farms  of 
German  neigbors.  As  late  as  1862  the  only  fences 
we  had  were  either  the  ditch-and-bank  or  rail  fences. 
In  sugar-making  time  mother  would  boil  the  sap 
from  the  Supar  maple  in  our  grove  and  make  syrup. 
Some  of  the  Maple  were  three  and  four  feet  through 
68 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX   I).  HAVBERO 

and  fifty  feet  to  the  nearest  limb ;  they  were  scarred 
as  high  as  you  could  reach  from  borings  by  people 
before  we  came.  I  suppose  the  indians  used  to  boil 
sap  there  before  the  white  people  came. 

Indians  used  to  call  at  our  log  house.  They  would 
be  hunting  or  trapping  and  would  beg  things  to  eat. 
One  winter  an  Indian  and  his  squaw  and  papoose 
called.  They  were  all  barefoot.  Mother  gave  them 
something  to  eat,  but  they  would  not  take  the  wheat 
bread  she  offered  them. 

Mother  brought  her  spinning  wheel  along  from  Ger- 
many. She  carded  the  wool  and  spun  all  the  yarn 
for  our  stockings  and  mittens  while  I  was  home,  and 
in  after  years  she  would  card  and  spin  our  wool  and 
knit  stockings  and  mittens  for  her  grand-children. 
The  old  spinning  wheel  and  wool  carder  is  now  in  the 
Rock  Island  County  Historical  Society. 

When  we  left  Moline  in  the  Spring  of  1853  they 
were  talking  about  the  railroad  from  Chicago  to  Rock 
Island.  They  got  it  through  in  1854.  A  newspaper 
called  the  Rock  Island  Advertiser,  dated  Dec.  24th, 
1853,  is  in  the  possession  of  the  County  Historical 
Society.  It  has  a  lot  of  interesting  reading  for  old 
timers.  It  says  the  railroad  track  is  laid  to  Geneseo, 
and  that  the  grading  west  of  Geneseo  is  nearly  com- 
plete, and  that  the  bridge  across  Rock  River  is  held 
up  on  account  of  not  being  able  to  get  the  timbers. 
It  says  that  the  section  from  the  Mississippi  river  to 
Iowa  City  is  under  contract,    and    another    railroad 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  HAIBERG 


The  spinning-wheel,  brought    from   Germany   by   my  parents. 


Company  is  organized  to  build  a  road  from  Warsaw, 
111.,  at  the  foot  of  the  Lower  rapids,  via  Rock  Island 
to  Port  Byron,  at  the  head  of  the  Upper  rapids.  This 
railroad  was  the  "Warsaw  &  Rockford  Ry.  Co.",  and 
some  of  our  neighbors  on  the  High  Prairie  bought 
stock  in  it.  In  this  newspaper  it  is  called  the  "Carbon- 
dale,  Warsaw  &  Rockford  Railroad." 

Another  thing  of  interest  in  the  old  newspaper  is 
the  market  quotations.  Hogs  were  $3.00  to  $3.50  to 
city  of  Rock  Island  butchers,  and  $4.00  to  $4.10  in 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  HAVBERG 

St.  Louis.  Chickens  were  $1.50  per  dozen ;  turkeys 
50  and  75c  apice;  quails  30c  per  dozen;  lard  6!/o  to 
8c ;  potatoes  20c  to  30c  per  bushel ;  butter,  fresh  in 
rolls  15  to  18c;  eggs  18  to  20c  per  dozen;  oats  20  to 
25c;  wheat  65  to  75c;  corn  20  to  25c,  and  "Whiskey, 
rectified"  281/oc  to  31c. 

This  newspaper  also  tells  of  a  new  hack  just  put 
on  between  Moline  and  Rock  Island.  "The  hack  leaves 
Rock  Island  at  7.15  and  10.00  a.  m.,  and  leaves  Moline 
at  8.15  and  11  o'clock  and  leaves  Rock  Island  at  2.00, 
and  Moline  from  Nurse's  store  at  4.30  p.  m."  This 
hack  line  was  run  by  John  Lusk,  and  was  originally 
started  by  N.  Lynch. 

The  same  spring  that  we  moved  up  from  Moline, 
father  sold  our  house  and  lot  in  Moline  to  Alex  Swan- 


Military  Bounty  I,and  Act  of  28  September,  1850. 


REGISTER'S    OR*  ICE, 

^ ^/^zZj^^dYZ^  ^^fs/g?  *~I8    &  3 
MILITARY  LAND  WARRANT  No.  J^^^m  the  narne    of     ^^X^^ 

s  ~\^  ^f  has  this  day  been  located  by    ^-/^'Si^*- ^Z^ 

quarter  ot  Section       f(J  m  'I'ownship  *Zr       -^s^ 

of  Range        <y//'    /Y~L£6<^f  subject  to  any  preemption 

claim  which  may  be  filed  tor  said  land  within  forty  days  from  this  date. 
Contents  of  tract  located         ~\ 
/j    £/  Acres. 


Y-^/fS/%//J/Z^^  Re^'er- 


Certificate   showing   Military    Bounty   Land    located    by    Father,    in    1853. 

71 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  HAUBERG 

der  for  a  horse  and  buggy,  a  sadlle,  and  a  hundred  and 
seventy-five  dollars  in  money. 

Before  the  end  of  the  first  year,  father  made  two 
trips  to  the  U.  S.  Land  office  at  Dixon,  111.  He  went 
afoot  because  he  could  make  better  time  that  way.  It 
was  about  forty-five  miles  one  way.  On  one  of  these 
trips  he  walked  there  and  back  inside  of  Twenty-four 
hours.  He  left  home  shortly  after  midnight  carrying 
enough  lunch  for  the  trip,  and  took  several  pair  of 
woolen  stockings  which  mother  had  knit  and  which 
he  sold  in  Dixon.  He  transacted  the  business  at  the 
Land  Office  and  got  back  home  late  that  night.  Fred 
Owens  of  Cordova  mentioned  this  a  few  years  ago.  He 
said  father  had  stopped  at  their  log  house  at  the  Middle 
Crossing  at  two  or  three  o'clock  in  the  morning  and 
was  back  at  eleven  or  twelve  o'clock  that  night. 

August  13,  1853,  he  located  or  "entered"  one-hun- 
dred-twenty acres  of  land.  Eighty  acres  of  this  he 
entered  for  a  neighbor,  Krabbenhoeft,  next  south  of 
our  farm  in  section  thirteen.  The  other  forty  was 
the  northwest  quarter  of  the  southeast  quarter  of  sec- 
tion eleven,  Coe,  now  owned  by  Harry  Cook.  Father 
would  have  pre-empted  the  forty  next  east  of  it  also 
but  a  man  by  the  name  of  Henry  S.  Steele  entered  it 
just  ahead  of  him  on  the  same  day,  so  he  bought 
that  forty  of  Steele,  paying  him  sixty-nine  dollars  for 
it ;  six  dollars  cash  and  sixty-three  dollars  on  credit. 

October  12,  1853,  he  pre-empted  a  quarter  section 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX   D.  HAl  BERG 

in  section  eleven.     We   still   have  the   certificate.     It 
reads  as  follows : 

"Land  Office  at  Dixon,  Illinois,  October  12,  1853. 

"It  is  hereby  certified  that  John  D.  Hauberg,  of  Rock 
Island  County,  Illinois,  on  the  12th  day  of  October, 
1853,  filed  at  this  office,  a  declaration  of  his  intention 
to  claim  the  North  half  of  the  Southwest  Quarter  and 
the  South  half  of  the  Northwest  Quarter  of  Section 
No.  Eleven,  in  Township  No.  19,  Range  No.  Two  East, 
as  a  Pre-emption  Right  under  the  provisions  of  the  Act 
of  Congress,  approved  September  4th,  1841. 

"Dating  his  settlement  on  the  27th  day  of  Semptem- 
ber,  1853.  (Signed)  Hugh  Wallace,  Register." 

When  the  1853  harvest  began  we  worked  for  Isaiah 
Marshall  at  a  dollar  and  twenty-five  cents  a  day,  bind- 
ing grain.  I  helped  with  that  for  about  two  weeks, 
and  then  hired  out  to  Isaiah  Marshall  to  help  dig  the 
cellar  for  the  brick  house  where  John  Woodburn  lives 
now  (in  Sec.  17,  Canoe  Creek  Twp.).  Turner  did  the 
masonry  work.  He  had  just  come  from  England.  He 
was  the  father  of  Tom  Turner  of  Port  Byron.  He  lived 
in  the  northern  part  of  Coe  township  where  John 
Moody  afterwards  lived.  John  Donahoo  did  the  car- 
penter work.     He  was  father  of  E.  C.  Donahoo. 

After  the  cellar  was  dug  I  worked  for  Jerry  Pearson 
picking  corn  for  ten  dollars  a  month ;  then  for  Fred 
Owens,  picking  corn,  for  ten  dollars  a  month.  After 
corn  picking  my  brother  Dave  came  home  and  stayed 
home.  I  worked  for  Wm.  G.  Marshall  all  winter  for 
ten  dollars  a  month.  73 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  J).  1IM  BERU 


«.  •*  It,* v  *  w  v»J T^JTz* 


M 


THE    Wiiui.  CARDER 


There  were  three  tribes  of  Marshalls.  We  called  one 
of  them  the  "Cordova  Marshalls,"  another  was  the 
"Prairie  Marshalls,"  and  the  other  "Lawyer  Mar- 
shalls." Isaiah  Marshall  was  the  "Lawyer  Marshall" 
and  his  family  was  made  up  of  four  boys  and  five  girls, 
namely,  Joe,  Bill,  John,  Brice,  Mary,  Jane,  Priscilla, 
Anna  and  Sarah.  Mrs.  Dave  Trowbridge  and  William 
and  Ida  Feaster  are  grandchildren  of  Isaiah  Marshall. 
He  was  an  officer  in  the  war  of  1812. 

The  "Prairie  Marshalls"  were  John,  William  who 

74 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  HAUBERG 

was  always  known  as  "Billy  G.,"  Henry,  Jake  and 
Theodore,  called  "Dora,"  and  Lettie. 

The  "Cordova  Marshalls"  were  cousins  of  the 
"Prairie  Marshalls,"  and  were  as  follows:  William, 
always  known  as  "Squire  Bill" ;  George,  who  was 
father  of  Attorney  C.  B.  Marshall  of  Rock  Island; 
John,  called  "Gooseneck  John" ;  Johnty,  and  Charles 
B.,  who  owned  and  lived  on  the  farm  now  the  D.  H. 
Bracker  Estate,  in  Canoe  Creek  Township  (in  Sec.  7). 

Amos  Golden  and  his  wife  were  working  for  "Billy 
G"  in  the  winter  of  '53 — 4  also,  Mrs.  Golden  as  hired 
girl  and  Mr.  Golden  as  hired  man.  They  had  one  child, 
a  little  boy  named  William,  two  years  old.  Christmas 
time  Mr.  Golden  bought  160  acres  of  land  of  Nathaniel 
Belcher  for  five  dollars  an  acre.  When  Mr.  Belcher 
came  out  to  make  the  deed,  Amos  went  upstairs  and 
got  a  sack  of  gold,  dumped  it  on  the  table  and  counted 
out  eight  hundred  dollars,  put  the  balance  back  in  the 
sack  and  took  it  upstairs  again. 

That  winter  Amos  Golden  cut  wood  on  Port  Byron 
bluff  and  Mr.  Marshall  and  I  hauled  it  home.  We  made 
two  trips  a  day,  hauling  on  wagons.  The  weather  was 
cold  and  the  snow  was  deep.  We  had  five  miles  to  haul 
and  would  not  get  home  until  about  eight  o'clock  in 
the  evening.  Then  we  had  the  chores  to  do.  We  had 
no  lantern.  I  wore  cowhide  boots  —  no  oevershoes  — 
and  the  boots  would  be  frozen  stiff  on  my  feet  and  I 
had  to  thaw  them  out  before  I  could  get  them  off. 

We  also  hauled  lumber  for  Mr.  Golden's  house  from 

75 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX   /).  HAUBERO 

Port  Byron.  It  was  tough,  but  I  liked  the  place. 
Father  got  his  seed  wheat  and  oats  there  in  the  spring 
of  1854  for  what  I  had  earned.  I  stayed  with  Mr.  Mar- 
shall that  summer  and  the  next  winter,  1854,  at  the 
same  price.  In  the  fall  I  had  to  get  up  about  daybreak 
and  drive  sandhill  cranes  and  wild  geese  out  of  the 
corn.    There  were  thousands  of  cranes  and  geese  living 


RECEIVED  OF 
being  the  amount  of  f: 
of  Land,  for  the  year  lagg"1 


Woo*  /./^,/rv.<2^ 

. /2^e-^<''<^-     £ 

.  >lu.-  the  State  of  Illinois  and  countv* 


/ 


/$£>? 


_.   Dollars. 

tin  following  tract 


jt^J^/tf 


iVrfM.nnl  Property 


2-^ 


H 


'/-is 

'•'■ 


.-  i  ■ 

t-cf, 


2 /If,     //■{■ 


/Z-l> 


2-Z- 

(6 


//Z 

m 

4-p 

9} 


2-fr 


Collector. 


An    L854    tax    receipt,    showing    "Penn"    Township,    now    Cur   Town,    and    also    the 
;iiii"iint    we  used   t"  pay  on  our  land. 

near  the  Meredocia  and  they  almost  shaded  the  sun  — 
they  would  breed  there  —  and  there  were  hundreds  of 
muskrat  houses  in  the  swamps.  The  geese  laid  their 
eggs  on  top  of  a  muskrat's  house.  When  the  little 
goslings  were  hatched  the  old  geese  would  bring  them 
out  on  high  ground.  On  Sundays  we  boys  would  go 
down  to  the  'Docia  to  catch  goslings ;  but  the  ganders 
would  keep  watch  and  tell  the  goose  we  were  coming. 
After  the  gander  had  seen  us  we  would  hurry  to  catch 
the  goslings,  but  we  were  too  slow;  the  little  fellows 
would  scramble  into  the  water.  We  amused  ourselves 
listening  to  the  little  fellows  telling  the  old  goose  how 

7(i 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX   I).  HAUBERQ 

lucky  they  were  not  to  get  caught.  There  were  hun- 
dreds of  them.  When  we  picked  corn  we  found  they 
had  eaten  out  eight  or  ten  acres.  They  stuck  their 
bills  under  the  shuck  and  picked  the  corn  off  the  cob. 

When  I  quit  Wm.  G.  Marshall's  in  the  spring  of 
1855,  I  bought  four  steers  from  him,  coming  four  years 
old,  for  one  hundred  dollars.  We  yoked  them,  a  pair 
at  a  time,  behind  the  old  oxen  that  were  broke,  and 
drove  them.  When  seed  time  came  we  had  them  pretty 
well  trained  to  work  with  other  cattle.  I  quit  Mar- 
shall's March  first. 

Father  bought  a  reaper  to  cut  our  grain  in  1855. 
Before  that  we  used  the  cradle.  Our  1854  wheat  crop 
we  hauled  to  Mr.  Obermeier  in  Moline;  our  1855  and 
'56  crops  we  hauled  to  Geneseo,  a  distance  of  sixteen 
miles.  We  would  leave  home  at  about  2  or  3  o'clock  in 
the  morning;  get  to  Talcott's  ferry  on  Rock  River 
about  sunrise ;  get  to  Geneseo  about  noon,  and  get  home 
about  10  o'clock  at  night.    Everybody  had  oxen. 

Our  1857  and  '58  crops  we  hauled  to  Port  Byron. 

Our  first  threshing  machine  was  called  a  "Beater." 
It  was  run  by  tread-power.  It  just  beat  the  grain  out 
of  the  straw;  it  had  only  a  cylinder  like  our  present 
threshers.  Two  men,  with  a  rake  each,  would  shake 
the  grain  out  of  the  straw,  and  one  man  with  a  fork 
would  throw  the  straw  away.  They  threshed  from 
forty  to  sixty  bushels  of  wheat  a  day.  When  the 
threshing  was  done,  we  set  the  fanning  mill  in  a  wagon 
box  and  cleaned  the  grain.    This  was  in  1854  and  '55. 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  J).  HAl'BERG 

In  1856  they  had  attached  a  fanning  mill  and  a  little 
straw  carrier  to  the  Beater. 

We  put  our  grain  in  rail  pens  in  the  field  where  we 
threshed.  We  put  chaff  on  the  bottom  and  straw  on 
the  sides  to  hold  the  grain  in,  and  when  we  had  it  full, 
we  covered  it  up  with  straw.  We  had  to  clean  all  our 
grain  over  the  fanning  mill.  We  marketed  all  our 
grain  in  sacks.  When  we  went  to  the  mill  it  took  us 
two  days,  if  we  had  good  luck. 

Folks  from  here  would  go  to  Como,  111.,  in  Whiteside 
County,  to  mill. 

In  1856  father  bought  a  span  of  horses  and  a  wagon. 
After  we  had  our  seeding  done  that  year  we  broke 
prairie  for  other  people  until  harvest  time  at  three 
dollars  and  fifty  cents  an  acre.  Then  father  bought 
eighty  acres  of  land  in  Section  Fourteen,  Coe  Town. 
We  broke  that  in  1857.  I  did  the  breaking  and  had 
August  Naeve,  a  boy  about  thirteen  years  old,  drive 
the  oxen.  He  drove  for  me  two  summers.  His  mother 
was  a  widow  and  lived  in  Moline. 

In  the  spring  of  1854  a  lot  of  our  acquaintances  and 
friends  from  Moline  moved  here.  Among  them  were 
Matthias  Kahler  with  three  sons,  Henry,  James  and 
John,  and  one  daughter,  Catherine;  Krabbenhoeft  and 
daughter  Ida ;  Marx  Wiese  and  three  sons,  Frederick, 
Henry  and  John,  and  one  daughter,  Anna;  John  Win- 
terfeldt  and  wife.  They  all  moved  on  farms.  In  1855 
there  came  from  Moline  to  locate  here  John  Hahn  and 
three  sons,  John,  William  and  James,  and  two  daugh- 
78 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  J).  HAUBERG 

ters,  Doris  and  Elizabeth.  Claus  Schnoor,  a  young 
man  of  about  seventeen  years,  came  that  year  to  work 
for  John  Marshall,  and  John  Liphardt,  a  boy  of  six- 
teen, came  from  New  York.  Henry  C.  First  also  came 
to  the  High  Prairie  in  1854  and  drove  oxen  for  Amos 
Golden,  breaking  prairie.  In  1856  Gottlieb  Stilz,  Paul 
Gottsche  and  John  Arp,  all  young  men,  came  and 
bought  land.  In  1857  John  Krebs  bought  land  here 
and  moved  on  it.  In  1859  Henry  Struve  bought  Krebs 
out  and  moved  to  the  farm. 

Coe  Township  had  at  that  time  a  hunters'  lodge 
owned  by  some  wealthy  Philadelphia  Irishmen.  They 
brought  with  them  three  men  who  permanently  located 
here.  One  was  Gottlieb  Stilz  who  had  served  as  gar- 
dener for  John  L.  Lambert  who  was  one  of  the  owners 
of  the  Lodge.  Stilz  was  from  Philadelphia.  He  after- 
wards married  my  oldest  sister.  Another  was  Alec 
Hasson,  coachman  for  Lambert,  who  came  and  brought 
his  family  with  him;  the  sons  were  James,  John  and 
George  Hasson.  The  other  man  was  Richard  Torpin, 
who  was  a  cousin  of  Mr.  Lambert.  He  moved  his 
family  here.  His  sons  were  Richard,  Joseph,  Henry 
and  Lambert  Torpin.  They  came  in  the  spring  of  1856. 
His  son  Richard  was  a  young  man  at  the  time,  and  the 
winter  after  they  came  here  he  taught  the  Walker 
school.  The  school  stood  on  the  west  side  of  the  road, 
just  opposite  the  present  residence  of  Alvin  Frels,  at 
about  the  middle  of  the  south  line  of  Section  18,  Canoe 
Creek  Township.     The  school  was  afterwards  moved 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX   l>.  JIM  BER6 

to  the  present  location  of  "Enterprise  school"  in  the 
northeast  quarter  of  Section  Eighteen. 

The  hunters'  lodge  or  house  was  built  of  sawmill 
lumber.  It  was  the  best  building  in  the  country.  They 
had  a  high  pole  with  a  big  lantern  on  top  and  at  night 
you  could  see  it  for  miles  around.  Their  lodge  stood 
on  the  highest  ground  in  this  part  of  the  country,  and 
was  out  in  what  is  now  the  field  east  of  George  Guinn's 
residence,  on  the  west  half  of  the  northeast  quarter  of 
Section  Fourteen,  Coe  Township.  They  hunted  all 
over  the  High  Prairie  and  the  Docia.  They  brought 
their  servants  with  them,  and  had  the  finest  hunting 
dogs  I  ever  saw,  some  of  them  worth  five  hundred  dol- 
lars, and  they  had  a  man  especially  to  take  care  of 
them. 

In  1860,  when  the  Prince  of  Wales,  Edward,  visited 
this  country  these  men  brought  him  here  on  a  hunting 
trip,  and  I  had  the  honor  of  drinking  whiskey  out  of 
the  same  bottle  with  him.  Mr.  Harte  introduced  me 
to  him.  He  said,  "You  want  to  take  off  your  hat  to 
this  man."  Mother  sold  these  men  milk,  butter  and 
eggs.  It  was  about  three-quarters  of  a  mile  from  the 
Lodge  to  our  house.  In  their  hunting  trips  they  often 
came  to  where  I  was  at  work  and  sat  an  hour  at  a  time 
talking  about  the  affairs  of  the  country,  which  inter- 
ested me.  I  was  in  the  piece  south  of  the  house  clear- 
ing ground  of  stumps  and  brush  when  they  brought 
the  Prince. 

These  hunters  came  every  spring  and  fall,  sometimes 
80 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  EAUBERO 

as  many  as  twenty  at  a  time.  They  were  finely  formed, 
big-sized  men.  W.  H.  Harte,  who  was  one  of  them, 
was  killed  as  a  Captain  on  a  gunboat  down  the  Missis- 
sippi during  the  rebellion.  He  had  farmed  the  eighty 
where  the  Lodge  stood  for  a  couple  of  years.  Father 
bought  the  eighty  in  the  southwest  quarter  of  Section 
Fourteen  through  Harte,  paying  $660.00  for  it.  We 
still  have  the  written  contract  signed  by  Harte  and 
Father.  It  is  like  a  good  many  deals  of  those  days. 
Nothing  was  paid  down.  The  contract  was  dated  Sept. 
30,  1855,  and  father  was  to  pay  for  the  land  Dec.  1st, 
1856. 

About  the  last  time  the  hunters  came  here,  they  set 
the  prairie  grass  afire  around  their  house  and  the  fire 
got  away  from  them.  It  burned  about  forty  rods  of 
rail  fence  for  us,  and  burned  eight  grain  stacks  for 
Tunis  Quick,  Tom  Quick's  father.  It  was  all  the  grain 
they  had  harvested  that  year. 

Early  in  the  spring  of  1856  I  drove  to  Port  Byron  to 
meet  Rev.  C.  A.  T.  Selle,  the  German  Lutheran  home 
missionary.  The  roads  were  muddy  from  the  spring 
thaw.  The  next  day  was  Sunday,  and  our  friends  and 
neighbors  met  at  our  log  house  for  church  services. 
We  organized  a  church  and  arranged  to  have  preaching 
regularly.  The  neighbors  took  turns  having  preaching 
at  their  homes,  and  if  there  was  no  other  place,  they 
came  to  our  house  whether  it  was  our  turn  or  not. 
There  was  a  small  lot  of  German  Lutherans  in  Rock 
Island  that  were  getting  started  at  the  same  time,  but 

81 
Memoirs.     6. 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  HAVBERG 

we  had  the  biggest  and  best  congregation.  Rev.  Selle 
was  a  representative  of  the  Missouri  Synod,  and  we 
naturally  came  to  be  a  congregation  of  that  synod. 
These  were  the  first  beginnings  of  the  German  Luther- 
an Church  in  Rock  Island  County. 

In  the  summer  of  1856  the  neighbors  got  up  a  sub- 
scription list  in  order  to  start  a  school  in  our  district. 
It  was  the  formation  of  what  we  called  the  "Bluff 
School."  It  is  called  by  that  name  now.  Father  and 
Tunis  Quick  and  Amos  Golden  were  elected  Directors 
of  the  school.  They  built  a  little  frame  building  about 
twelve  by  fourteen  on  Amos  Golden's  farm,  on  the  west 
side  of  the  road  running  north  and  south  through  the 
middle  of  Section  Eleven,  a  little  north  of  the  center 
of  the  section.  Calvin  Lambert  was  our  first  teacher. 
He  was  a  young  man  at  the  time.  Later  he  married 
Phoebe  Quick,  a  very  nice  girl.  We  had  a  fine  school. 
We  used  the  McGuffy  school  books,  and  the  Sanders 
school  books  were  beginning  to  come  in  also.  Joe 
Torpin,  his  sister,  now  Mrs.  Mary  Allen,  Cy.  Comfort 
and  his  sister  Louise,  who  afterward  married  Levi 
Stout  (Mrs.  C.  B.  Marshall's  mother),  John  and  Henry 
Quick  were  among  the  older  scholars  there  when  it 
started. 

For  some  time  our  German  Lutheran  minister  held 
services  at  this  school  also.  He  would  preach  in  Ger- 
man in  the  forenoon,  and  in  the  afternoon  in  English, 
to  a  large  congregation  made  up  from  the  whole  neigh- 
borhood.    This  kept  up  until  we  got  a  preacher  who 

82 


MEMOIRS  OF  .1/  I /.'A    I).  HAVBERG 

was  not  satisfied  unless  he  condemned  everything  that 
was  not  Lutheran.  That  ended  the  English  preaching 
because  our  English-speaking  neighbors  were  not  Lu- 
theran. Afterward  a  Rev.  Rutledge,  who  lived  about 
five  miles  back  of  LeClaire,  la.,  came  and  preached  in 
this  school  house.  He  was  from  the  same  part  of  New 
Jersey  that  the  Goldens  and  the  Marshalls  were  from. 
Later  still  the  Baptist  minister  from  Cordova  held 
services  here.  His  name  was  Rev.  Asa  Prescott.  He 
had  revival  meetings  there. 

We  also  had  a  debating  society  at  that  little  school, 
and  had  it  crowded. 

Not  many  men  around  here  knew  how  to  conduct  a 
public  meeting.  When  they  voted  on  moving  the  school 
to  its  present  location,  Tunis  Quick  was  presiding.  He 
voted  the  same  as  the  others,  and  it  was  a  tie.  So  he 
voted  again  as  presiding  officer  and  that  gave  his  side 
a  majority.  I  think  I  was  the  only  one  present  that 
knew  it  was  wrong  for  a  presiding  officer  to  vote  twice, 
and  I  explained  it.  That  gave  the  majority  to  those 
who  wanted  to  move  the  school  to  its  present  location. 
We  bought  the  present  school  lot  from  Gottlieb  Stilz. 
The  deed  to  the  lot  is  dated  Sept.  11,  1865. 

After  we  got  the  German  minister  to  come  up  to  the 
High  Prairie,  we  also  started  a  singing  school.  They 
met  at  father's  at  first  and  afterwards  changed  about 
among  the  neighbors.  We  had  very  good  singing.  I 
think  it  was  Rev.  Doescher  that  led  it  at  first,  and  Rev. 
Gruber  kept  it  up  when  he  came. 

83 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  HAVBEBG 

Some  time  after  we  had  moved  the  public  school  to 
its  present  location,  we  started  an  English  singing 
school.  It  was  the  first  American  singing  school 
around  here.  Clyde  Fleming  was  our  first  song  teacher. 


Melodion  used  bj  Wm.  Fowler  in  his  Singing  Class  at 
Bluff  School  in  Coe  Town.  This  instrument  was  brought 
from  Vermont  to  Rock  Island  County  by  the  George  E. 
Holmes  family   in    L846. 

He  was  a  brother  of  Wilson  Fleming  who  afterwards 
had  a  drug  store  at  Port  Byron.  Both  the  brothers 
were  born  in  Coe  Town.  Years  afterward  a  man  from 
LeClaire,  la.,  by  the  name  of  William  Fowler  had  a 
singing  school  at  Bluff  school.    He  used  the  little  melo- 

S4 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX    l>.  HAVBERG 

cleon  that  Dr.  W.  H.  Lyford  presented  to  the  County 
Historical  Society.  Dr.  Lyford's  wife's  folks  brought 
it  from  Vermont  in  1846.  Fowler  was  a  good  song 
teacher  and  always  had  a  house  full. 

Christian  Kramhoft  lived  on  the  farm  next  South 
of  us  in  section  thirteen.  Father  pre-empted  his 
eighty  for  him.  He  was  a  widower  with  one  daughter. 
After  he  located  here  he  married  a  widow  with  four 
children.  In  the  fall  of  1855  she  gave  birth  to  a  child 
that  had  the  small  pox.  Mother  was  there  to  attend 
the  sick  woman,  and  continued  taking  care  of  her 
until  she  herself  came  down  with  the  small  pox.  Fa- 
ther and  my  three  little  sisters  also  got  it.  Elizabeth 
and  Catherine  were  badly  scarred  for  life,  but  Mar- 
garet, the  youngest,  was  not  so  sick  and  had  only  four 
or  five  scars  in  her  face.  My  brother  Dave  did  the 
chores  and  I  did  the  house  work  and  attended  the  sick. 
Mrs.  Kramhoft  and  the  baby  died.  People  were  afraid 
to  go  near  the  place  for  fear  of  getting  the  disease, 
and  Mr.  Kramhoft  made  the  coffin  and  buried  his  wife 
near  the  house  with  no  services  and  no  one  present 
except  himself  and  the  children.  His  first  wife  had 
died  of  cholera  on  the  trip  here  from  Germany,  and 
the  widow  he  married  afterward  had  also  lost  her 
husband  in  the  same  cholera  plague  on  the  way  from 
the  old  country. 

In  the  winter  of  1856  they  had  a  German  school  at 
the  home  of  this  same  Kramhoft.  William  Riewerts 
lives  on  the  place  now  but  it  is  not  the  same  house. 

85 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  HAUBERO 

Kramhoft's  house  was  built  by  setting  posts  in  the 
ground,  with  poles  fastened  to  them.  They  filled  the 
space  between  these  poles  with  cornstalks,  and  plast- 
ered it  all  over  with  clay  mixed  with  "buffalo  chips". 
It  was  whitewashed  inside  and  out.  The  roof  was 
of  bull-grass  thatch.  It  looked  as  neat  as  shingles, 
or  neater.  I  do  not  think  he  had  a  nail  in  the  house. 
He  drove  pegs  to  hold  the  poles  together.  I  attended 
that  school  also,  to  learn  Luther's  Catechism.  We  also 
had  reading,  writing  and  arithmetic.  John  Arp  was 
the  teacher.  There  were  eight  of  us  from  the  High 
Prairie,  some  were  from  Port  Byron  Bluff,  and  some 
from  Hampton   Bluff,   nineteen   in  all.     We  were  all 


( !i  nfirmation 


rtificate,    issui  I    to   me   in    L857.      It    was   tie   first    German 
Lutheran  class  in  Rock  Island  County. 


86 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX    1>.  JIM  BERO 

confirnmed  in  the  Lutheran  faith  on  May  24th,  1857, 
in  the  Port  Byron  Congregational  church.  Rev.  G. 
Chr.  Friedrich  was  the  minister  in  charge  of  the  class. 
This  was  the  first  German  Lutheran  class  in  Rock  Is- 
land County.  The  only  others  for  that  year  being  at 
Rock  Island  where  one  girl  from  Muscatine,  Iowa,  and 
one  from  the  Edgington  settlement  were  confirmed. 
Our  teacher,  John  Arp,  was  a  brother  to  Mrs.  Henry 
Kuehl  of  Moline. 

Our  congregation  lasted  about  forty  years.  We 
never  built  a  church.  The  congregation  never  was 
quite  big  enough,  and  at  the  time  we  should  have 
grown,  some  of  us  joined  the  Grangers,  Free  Masons, 
Farmers  Mutual  Benefit  Association,  and  the  Modern 
Woodmen  of  America.  The  Missouri  Synod  of  Luther- 
ans does  not  allow  its  members  to  join  secret  societies, 
so  we  were  ousted,  and  the  church  kept  getting  smaller. 
For  many  years  we  had  services  at  Bluff  school  at  its 
present  location  (middle  of  the  south  line  of  section 
eleven,  Coe  township),  and  Rev.  Louis  Winter  of  the 
Hampton  Bluff  church  was  our  last  pastor.  The 
earlier  ministers  of  our  congregation  were  Rev.  C.  A. 
T.  Sells,  Rev.  G.  Chr.  Friedrich  who  was  in  charge 
at  the  time  of  our  first  confirmation  service,  May  24, 
1857,  Rev.  Gruber,  Rev.  Doescher,  and  Rev.  C.  A. 
Mennicke.  All  these  men  made  our  log  house  their 
home  when  they  came  to  preach.  Rev.  Menicke  was 
a  young  unmarried  man  when  he  first  came.  He  also 
preached  at  Hampton  Bluff  where  the  Henry  Frels' 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  HAUBERG 

were  prominent  members  of  his  congregation.  The 
Frels'  home  was  his  headquarters  most  of  the  time 
when  he  preached  for  the  Hampton  Bluff  people.  My 
wife,  who  at  that  time  was  Miss  Anna  Margaret  Frels, 

was  one  of  the  bridesmaids 
at  the  wedding  when  Rev. 
Mennicke  and  Miss  Anna 
Mangelsdorf  were  married, 
in  1861.  He  was  pastor  of 
the  Rock  Island  church  for 
about  fifty  years. 

The  only  thing  that  is  left 
of  the  old  Lutheran  congre- 
gation on  the  High  Prairie 
to-day  is  the  little  cemetery. 
I  donated  the  land  for  that 
in  the  Southwest  corner  of 
my  farm. 

The  fir;st  class  of  the 
Hampton  Bluff  Lutheran 
church  held  its  confirmation 
exercises  in  the  hall  over  the  L.  F.  Baker  store 
at  Hampton.  This  was  in  the  spring  of  1860.  They 
had  been  holding  their  church  services  in  a  brick  build- 
ing, up  the  hollow  a  ways,  in  the  village  of  Hampton. 
Among  the  members  of  that  class  was  Miss  Anna  M. 
Frels,  who  became  my  wife  two  years  later,  and  was 
"My  Better  half"  for  over  fifty-six  years. 


HENRY    FRELS. 


SS 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  HMll/:i>'<; 

In  1857  when  township  organization  took  place, 
Henry  Lascelles,  Edward  McFadden  and  John  D.  Hau- 
berg,  my  father,  were  the  first  three  Road  Commis- 
sioners elected  in  Coe  township.  Father  was  elected 
for  three  years.  He  could  not  read  or  write  English. 
They  had  a  great  deal  of  work  to  do.  The  country 
began  to  settle  up.  We  had  been  driving  straight 
through  the  country  wherever  the  road  was  best.  The 
settlers  began  to  fence  up  the  roads,  and  they  had  to 
lay  out  new  ones.  Each  of  the  Commissioners  got  a 
Law  and  Form  book  on  Township  organization.  I 
did  the  writing  for  father,  and  learned  about  all  the 
forms  by  heart.  I  could  write  a  road  petition,  or  a 
road  or  fence  notice,  without  looking  in  the  book.  We 
also  got  a  book  "Every  man  his  own  Lawyer."  The 
first  two  winters  as  a  bachelor,  I  read  law.  I  made 
up  my  mind  I  would  be  a  lawyer,  but  the  more  I  read 
the  less  I  knew,  and  I  made  up  my  mind  I  was  a  fool 
and  I  quit ;  but  atferwards  I  found  it  did  me  some  good. 
Sometimes  a  new  Justice  of  the  Peace  would  come  to 
me  to  help  him  make  out  a  State  Warrant,  and  if  they 
had  an  important  law  suit  and  one  side  had  a  lawyer 
and  the  other  side  hade  none,  the  Squire  would  send 
for  me  to  defend  them  and  I  was  pretty  successful. 

The  oath  of  office  which  a  Township  officer  took 
in  1857  had  more  to  it  then  we  have  now.  It  was  as 
follows : 


so 


MEMOIR*  OF  MARX    D.  HAl  HE  ltd 

State  of  Illinois  ) 

ss 
Rock  Island  County    ) 

I do  solemnly  swear  that  I 

will  support  the  Constitution  of  the  United  States  and 
of  the  State  of  Illinois,  and  that  I  will  according  to 
the  best  of  my  judgment,  skill  and  ability,  diligently, 
faithfully  and  impartially,  perform  all  the  duties  en- 
joined on  me  as of  the  Town  of 

in  the  County  of  Rock  Island  and  State  of  Illinois." 

"I  do  solemnly  swear  that  I  have  not  fought  a  duel, 
nor  sent  or  accepted  a  challenge  to  fight  a  duel,  the 
probable  issue  of  which  might  have  been  the  death 
of  either  party,  nor  in  any  manner  aided  or  assisted 
in  such  duel  nor  been  knowingly  the  bearer  of  such 
challenge  or  acceptance  since  the  adoption  of  the  Con- 
stitution, and  that  I  will  not  be  so  engaged  or  concerned 
directly  or  indirectly  in  or  about  any  such  duel  during 
my  continuance  in  office,  so  help  me  God." 

The  above  form  was  signed  by  the  men  elected,  and 
sworn  to  before  a  Justice  of  the  Peace. 

September  29,  1858,  I  was  twenty-one  years  old 
and  I  left  home,  with  twenty-five  cents  in  my  pocket. 
Father  was  not  a  poor  man  any  more ;  if  he  had  been, 
I  would  have  stayed  with  him.  I  went  to  John  Mar- 
shall and  got  a  job  for  $14.00  a  month.  The  next 
morning  father  came  there  and  rented  to  me  his  eighty 
acres  in  Section  14 ;  but  before  I  rented  it  I  bought 
a  team  of  horses  and  a  plow  and  an  old  linch-pin 
-.•(I 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX    D.  JIM  BERG 

wagon  from  him  for  $300.00  and  gave  him  a  note,  due 
one  year  from  date,  with  ten  percent  interest ;  then 
I  rented  the  land  for  one  year  for  $300.00. 

I  bought  a  stove  from  John  Marshall,  a  two-bushel 
sack  of  flour,  two  bushels  of  potatoes  and  some  meat 
a  knife  and  fork  and  a  tin  cup,  and  stayed  there  and 
worked  to  pay  for  these  things.  Then  I  went  back 
to  father's,  got  my  horses,  the  old  wagon  and  plow, 
then  to  John  Marshall's  and  got  my  stove,  flour,  po- 
tatoes, meat,  knife  and  fork  and  tin  cup,  borrowed 
an  ax  and  went  into  the  timber  and  cut  stove  wood 
to  finish  out  my  load,  then  to  my  rented  farm,  into  a 
little  shanty  we  had  built  when  we  broke  the  land. 
I  unloaded  and  went  back  to  John  Marshall  and  bought 
a  wagon  box  full  of  corn — about  fourteen  bushels — 
at  twenty  cents  a  bushel,  to  be  paid  for  in  work  at 
corn  picking  time.  Then  I  went  back  to  the  shanty, 
got  my  dinner,  unloaded  the  corn  in  the  shanty,  tied 
my  horses  to  the  wagon  and  went  to  my  nearest 
neighbor  "Col"  William  Johnson,  one  mile  and  a  half 
southeast,  borrowed  a  scythe  and  cut  grass  for  the 
horses.  I  got  water  from  the  creek  about  80  rods  to 
the  south,  near  where  the  Adelphia  school  huose  now 
stands — my  shantay  stood  where  now  George  Ashdown 
lives — and  there  I  batched. 

After  breakfast  the  next  morning,  I  got  a  load  of 
posts  and  poles  from  father's  timber  to  build  a  stable. 
When  that  was  finished  I  started  to  plow,  and  I  plowed 
until  the  ground  froze.     Then  I  picked  corn  to  pay 

91 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  HMBERO 

for  the  corn  I  got  from  Marshall.  After  that  I  picked 
corn  on  shares  for  John  Marshall.  Corn  got  down  to 
fifteen  cents  a  bushel.  "A  man  does  not  pick  more 
than  12  to  15  bushels  a  day  and  it  does  not  pay  to 
hire  it  picked"  he  said.  I  picked  twenty-five  bushels 
a  day,  and  got  a  third  of  all  I  picked.  John  Marshall 
at  that  time  was  living  on  what  was  afterward  the 
William  Mill  stock  farm,  now  Wiltamuth's,  in  section 
six,  Canoe  Creek  township. 

About  the  first  of  December  father  came  over  to 
my  shanty  and  said  he  was  going  to  quit  farming  and 
would  rent  me  the  whole  farm  for  one  year.  I  told 
him  I  did  not  want  it  for  one  year  as  I  did  not  want 
to  stock  up  for  one  year,  not  knowing  what  I  was  going 
to  do  the  next  year,  but  would  take  it  for  four  years. 
He  rented  the  farm  to  me,  one  hundred  and  ninety 
acres,  for  four  years,  at  $600.00  a  year,  and  he  built 
a  house  on  section  14  where  I  was,  and  moved  into 
it  about  February  1st,  1859,  and  I  moved  into  the  old 
log  house  on  section  twelve.  In  1861  father  built  a 
barn,  size  34x36,  at  his  place  in  section  fourteen.  It 
was  the  largest  barn  in  the  country  except  the  one  of 
Marshall's. 

I  bought  one  yoke  of  oxen  from  him  for  $50.00 
and  two  cows  and  a  sow  for  $50.00,  and  gave  him 
my  note  for  $100.00  with  ten  per  cent  interest. 

There  were  about  eight  hired  men  in  this  part  of 
the  country  who  wanted  to  go  to  Moline  to  a  dance 
and  they  asked  me  to  take  them  there  for  $2.50  and 

U-2 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX   I).  HAUBERG 

my  expenses  to  the  dance,  which  I  agreed  to  do.  The 
evening  before  we  had  a  meeting  at  Paul  Gottsche's 
place  to  arrange  the  time  we  were  to  start  in  the  mor- 
ning. I  got  home  from  the  meeting  about  twelve 
o'clock,  gave  my  horses  some  hay  and  kicked  up  the 
bedding  for  them  and  then  went  to  bed.  The  next 
morning  my  best  horse  was  dead.  I  borrowed  a  horse 
from  Gottsche,  snaked  my  dead  horse  to  the  slough, 
and  when  I  came  back  everybody  was  ready  to  go. 
I  got  ready  and  we  went  to  Moline  to  the  dance.  This 
was  Christmas  of  1858. 

Mr.  C.  Krabbenhoeft  married  again  in  the  fall  of 
1858,  a  Mrs.  Bahlman  from  Davenport.  She  had  four 
children — two  boys,  Reimer,  nineteen,  and  James, 
fourteen  years  old,  and  two  daughters,  Anna,  twelve, 
and  Castina,  ten  years  old. 

I  picked  corn  all  winter.  In  January  the  snow  was 
so  deep  I  had  to  take  a  shovel  with  me  and  shovel  the 
snow  away  to  get  to  the  corn.  The  snow  blew  from 
the  bare  fields  and  the  corn  stalks  held  it,  forming 
drifts  from  four  to  six  feet  deep.  I  got  enough  corn 
for  feed  and  some  to  sell.  The  latter  part  of  Feb- 
ruary I  hauled  one  hundred  bushels  to  Hans  Beekman, 
in  Moline,  and  got  forty  dollars  cash  for  it. 

In  February,  1859,  there  was  a  sale  at  Dillon's  (they 
lived  near  Madison  Bowles.'  The  family  had  died 
out  and  everything  on  the  farm,  including  the  house- 
hold goods,  was  to  be  sold.  I  went  early  in  the  mor- 
ning because  I  wanted  to  talk  to  the  administrator. 

93 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX   D.  HAVBERG 

As  soon  as  I  found  him  I  told  him  who  I  was  and  what 
I  wanted.  I  said,  "I  am  a  young  man.  I  have  rented 
a  farm  six  miles  north  of  here  and  I  need  household 
goods.  I  see  you  have  it  for  sale.  I  would  like  to  buy 
some  but  I  have  no  money  to  pay  for  it  now.  If  I 
buy  anything  I  cant'  pay  fr  it  until  next  fall,  and  I 
don't  want  to  ask  anyone  to  sign  a  note  with  me." 

''Young  man,"  he  said,  "you  are  all  right.  Buy  what 
you  want  —  buy  it  all.  You  can  pay  me  when  you 
get  the  money." 

I  bought  the  stove,  two  bedsteads,  all  the  quilts 
but  one  —  that  was  too  fancy  for  me  —  all  the  dishes 
and  candle  molds  and  candlesticks,  and  the  knives 
and  forks ;  and  mother  gave  me  a  bed  when  I  started 
batching,  so  I  was  "all  set"  for  housekeeping.  I  had 
bought  chairs  and  a  table  of  Mr.  Snaphase,  in  Port 
Byron  —  the  man  who  built  the  stone  house  across 
the  street  from  and  a  little  below  the  depot  —  for 
$14.50,  to  be  paid  for  next  fall. 

I  bought  a  horse  four  years  old  from  Isaiah  Marshall 
for  one  hundred  thirty-five  dollars  and  gave  him  my 
note,  with  interest  at  ten  percent.  I  got  twenty  chick- 
ens, two  turkey  hens  and  a  goose  for  moving  father's 
stuff  to  the  new  house.  I  bought  one  hundred  bushels 
of  corn  from  him  at  twenty  cents  a  bushel.  I  traded 
one  hundred  fifty  bushels  of  corn  for  eighty  bushels 
of  seed  wheat.  I  bought  forty  bushels  of  seed  wheat 
at  fitfy  cents  a  bushel  and  gave  my  note  for  it.  I 
traded  a  cow  for  sixty  bushels,  bought  ten   bushels 

04 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX   D.  HAUBERG 

for  cash  and  traded  forty-four  bushels  of  corn  for 
a  cow. 

When  father  got  moved  he  let  brother  Dave  go, 
and  I  took  him  in  as  a  partner.  When  we  had  our 
seeding  done  in  the  spring,  one  of  our  neighbors 
borrowed  our  oxen  to  finish  his  seeding.  When  he 
had  finished  seeding  he  turned  the  oxen  loose  on  the 
prairie.  One  ox  came  home  with  the  cows.  I  looked 
for  the  other  and  saw  it,  a  half  mile  away,  on  the  hill. 
When  I  got  there  it  was  lying  down ;  the  cords  of  one 
of  its  hind  legs  had  been  cut  and  it  had  almost  bled 
to  death.  I  tied  my  handkerchief  around  its  leg  to 
stop  the  blood,  drove  the  ox  home  and  doctored  it 
up,  but  it  was  never  able  to  work.  This  was  the  "off" 
ox.  I  bought  a  steer  for  $35.00  to  mate  the  ox  we  had. 
Perhaps  you  do  not  understand  what  "off"  and  "near" 
are.  I  will  tell  you.  The  "near"  ox  is  the  left  hand 
side,  where  you  drive  —  that  is  the  "haw"  side;  the 
one  on  the  righthand  side  is  the  "off"  ox  —  that  is 
"gee". 

About  July  1st  my  other  horse  died  —  a  three 
hundred  dollar  team  gone.  I  bought  another  horse 
from  Roger  Bell,  afterwards  in  business  in  Port  Byron, 
for  one  hundred  dollars,  and  gave  him  my  note. 

The  first  Sunday  after  the  Fourth  of  July  my  broth- 
er, Dave,  was  accidentally  shot  in  the  hip,  which  left 
him  a  cripple  for  more  than  a  year.  I  had  to  pay 
$1.50  a  day  for  help  during  the  harvest,  after  thrash- 
ing.    When  we  thrashed  we  worked  our  oxen  on  the 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  HAVBERQ 

horse  power.  The  thrashers  did  not  like  this,  so  I 
asked  my  neighobr  to  put  his  horses  on,  which  he  did, 
and  I  let  him  have  my  oxen  to  deliver  his  barley,  which 
he  had  sold  and  had  to  deliver  that  week.  When  he 
got  half  way  to  town  with  his  load  of  barley  the  "off" 
ox  fell  dead.  It  was  a  warm  day  and  the  ox  became 
overheated.  Then  I  bought  three  more  oxen  and  rented 
more  land. 

Seventy  acres  of  wheat  that  I  had  in  section  14  went 
little  better  than  thirty-seven  bushels  to  the  acre.  This 
was  Canada  Club  wheat.  We  had  twenty  acres  of 
Red  River ;  that  went  twenty  bushels  to  the  acre.  We 
had  twenty-five  acres  Early  Robinson  wheat  —  on 
ten  acres  of  it  I  sowed  nine  and  one-half  bushels  — 
that  went  twenty-seven  bushels  to  the  acre.  I  sold 
that  in  Davenport  to  Hansen  (the  present  hardware 
and  seed-man's  father-in-law)  for  seed  at  $1.00  a 
bushel.  He  was  in  the  grain  business.  On  fifteen 
acres  of  it,  I  sowed  one  bushel  and  three  pecks  to  the 
acre ;  that  went  fifteen  bushels  to  the  acre.  I  had 
thirty-five  acres  of  barley,  that  went  thirty-five  bush- 
els to  the  acre.  I  sold  that  to  Schloepel,  the  brewery 
man  in  LeClaire,  for  forty-eight  cents  a  bushel ;  and  he 
gave  me  my  dinner,  all  the  beer  I  wanted  to  drink 
and  paid  the  ferry-man. 

When  I  hauled  wheat  to  Port  Byron  I  carried  a  lunch 
with  me.  There  were  no  restaurants.  When  I  had 
unloaded  the  wheat  I  would  tie  my  horses  to  the  wagon 
and  feed  them  in  the  box.  George  Wagner  had  a 
96 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  HAVBERG 

bakery  in  Moline  and  he  peddled  his  goods,  his  pie 
and  cake  along  the  road.  He  would  tie  his  team  to 
my  wagon  and  feed  them.  He  also  carried  his  lunch, 
and  we  would  go  to  Charley  Grey's  saloon  and  buy  a 
quart  of  beer  and  sit  down  and  eat  our  lunches.  Mr. 
Wagner  afterwards  bought  Schmidt's  brewery  near 
the  thirty-fist  street  depot  in  Rock  Island  and  changed 
the  name  to  Wagner's  brewery  and  afterward  it  be- 
came a  part  of  the  Rock  Island  Brewing  Company. 

Our  first  wheat  of  the  1859  crop  I  sold  for  42c  per 
bushel  and  paid  my  bills  at  the  store  and  other  little 
bills,  and  for  the  balance  I  bought  a  new  wagon. 

The  second  batch  of  wheat  I  sold  to  William  Mar- 
shall, grandfather  of  Attorney  C.  B.  Marshal  of  Rock 
Island.  I  hauled  the  wheat  to  the  "Diamond  Jo"  steam- 
boat warehouse  at  the  west  end  of  town.  The  grain 
at  that  time  was  always  put  into  sacks  and  the  sacks 
sewed  up  and  carried  on  the  steamboat  by  the  gang 
of  roustabouts  which  every  steamboat  carried.  Some- 
times the  grain  dealers  would  pile  the  sacks  in  a  high 
pile  on  the  river  bank  and  a  storm  would  come  up  and 
spoil  a  lot  of  the  grain. 

Cordova  at  this  time  was  a  busier  place  than  Port 
Byron.  All  the  business  part  of  the  town  was  at  the 
lower  end. 

Along  about  this  time  so  many  people  moved  here 
from  New  Jersey  and  located  in  the  upper  end,  east 
of  where  the  railroad  is  now,  and  about  the  public 
school,  they  called  it  "Jersey  Row". 

oi 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX   D.  II M  BERG 


Tin-   Diamond    Jo   warehouse   ;ii    Cordova,   to   which    we   hauled   wheat    in 


When  I  had  delivered  the  last  load  of  wheat,  I 
stopped  to  settle  up.  I  was  a  little  late  coming  in 
and  had  to  wait  my  turn  to  unload.  Mr.  Marshall 
was  running  a  general  store  and  had  gone  home  for 
supper. 

"He  will  be  back  pretty  soon",  the  Clerk  said,  "he 
has  gone  to  supper." 

I  waited  but  he  did  not  come,  so  I  went  to  the  house 
and  he  had  gone  to  bed.  I  told  him  I  wanted  to  settle 
as  I  had  to  help  my  neighbor  Monday  and  could  not 
come  to  Cordova.  He  came  back  to  the  store  with  me 
and  we  figured  up  the  amount  and  he  paid  me  $777.00. 
98 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX    I).   If M  BERG 

The  store  was  full  of  men.  The  Sterling  &  Rock  Is- 
land Railroad  was  being  built  at  that  time,  and  it 
being  Saturday  night,  the  men  working  on  the  railroad 
came  to  town  to  do  their  trading.  I  got  my  team 
and  started  home.  Before  I  got  out  of  town  I  had 
to  cross  a  little  bridge  about  ten  feet  wide.  There 
were  three  men  and  a  horse  and  buggy  on  it.  One  of 
the  men  asked  me  for  a  ride  and  I  told  him  to  get  in. 
He  got  in  and  the  other  two  men  got  in  the  buggy  and 
we  all  started  away.  It  was  a  bright  moonlight  night. 
Three  miles  out  of  Cordova  is  a  Jack  oak  grove. 
When  we  got  to  about  the  middle  of  the  grove  —  a 
mile  away  from  anybody,  and  trees  darkening  the 
road  —  I  saw  my  near  horse  rearing  up,  somebody 
having  a  hold  of  his  bit.  It  gave  a  plunge  to  the  right 
and  kicked  the  fellow.  In  a  flash  it  struck  me,  "Those 
fellows  are  after  my  money."  The  man  on  the  seat 
with  me  had  thrown  one  foot  over  mine.  I  hit  him 
with  my  arm,  under  his  throat  and  took  him  by  the 
leg  and  pushed  him  out.  The  other  fellow  was  trying 
to  get  hold  of  my  neck ;  but  the  horses  turning  and 
running,  threw  him  out  of  balance.  Before  he  got 
on  his  feet  again  I  got  him  by  the  throat.  When  he 
did  not  move  any  more  I  shouted  "Whoa"  and  the 
horses  stopped.  About  eighty  rods  out  on  the  prairie 
— my  man  was  quiet  —  I  picked  him  up  and  threw 
him  out  of  the  wagon.  I  jumped  out  of  the  wagon 
and  picked  up  my  lines,  got  on  again  and  drove  home. 
It  was  12:30  o'clock  when  I  got  home. 

99 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  HAIBERG 

If  I  had  had  good  clothes  on,  I  think  they  would  have 
tried  to  murder  me  for  my  money.  As  it  was  —  I 
had  a  hickory  shirt  on,  a  five-cent  straw  hat,  and  most 
likely  patched  trousers  and  perhaps  was  bare-foot  — 
they  picked  me  for  a  green  country  boy  who  knew 
nothing.  When  I  got  the  money  I  wrapped  it  up  in 
wrapping  paper  and  put  it  in  my  pocket  —  I  had  no 
pocketbook  —  and  they  saw  it. 

Ten  years  afterwards  I  was  in  Davenport,  in  a 
restaurant.  A  man  came  up  to  me  and  said,  "Do  you 
live  east  of  Cordova?" 

I  said,  "Yes." 

"Do  you  know  me?"  he  asked. 

"No." 

"I  know  you.  Do  you  remember  the  time  you  got 
a  handful  of  money  in  the  store  and  three  fellows 
stopped  you  on  the  bridge  in  Cordova,  and  tried  to 
hold  you  up  when  you  got  in  the  timber?" 

"Yes,  I  do." 

"Well,  I  was  one  of  the  fellows  that  was  to  hold  the 
horses.  The  big  fellow  sitting  in  the  seat  with  you 
was  to  take  the  money  out  of  your  pocket ;  and  if  you 
made  any  resistance,  I  was  to  hold  you.  I  don't  know 
what  happened  to  me ;  but  when  I  awoke  the  next 
morning  the  sun  was  shining  and  I  was  lost  on  the 
prairie  —  no  house  in  sight.  I  will  tell  you  how  I 
happened  to  be  there.  My  folks  lived  in  Iowa  City. 
Father  was  in  business  there,  and  he  had  a  farm  near 
town.     I  had  been  off  to  school.     When  I  came  home 

100 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX    I).  JIM  BERG 

it  was  about  haying  time  and  he  told  me  to  grind 
the  sickle  and  get  the  mower  ready,  and  get  things 
ready  in  general.  The  next  week  when  they  hitched 
on  the  mower  it  was  not  ready;  father  gave  me  a 
scolding.  I  made  up  my  mind  he  could  do  his  own 
haying,  and  I  left.  I  heard  they  were  building  a  rail- 
road up  there  and  I  went.  I  got  in  the  wrong  company, 
got  to  drinking,  playing  cards  for  money  and  went 
from  bad  to  worse.  When  I  woke  up  that  morning 
I  was  sober  and  began  to  realize  my  position.  I  start- 
ed at  once  for  Iowa  City  and  made  a  clean  confession 
to  father.  I  am  a  married  man  now  and  well  to  do. 
Here  is  my  address.  Come  and  see  us.  My  folks 
will  be  glad  to  see  you.  They  know  about  the  happen- 
nings.     Good-by." 

The  railroad  grade  at  that  time  was    being    built 
across  the  'Docia  from  Erie  to  Cordova.     The  right 


"       ^&    .       iluirsiuu  mill  IRorkfiiril  IRnilroniL 

Q: 


~4<Cfi? .,.-.../  x.,sy^^MiB&W  AN©  EOCKFdJUD  IRA2!L!R©AD, 


_~/u,„    *j£  <r~U*~&a  ^*4Z.  4~*yi4  **U?-*f ■*.*&£/*£  . 


Q>t<£&£4&Z!£—  Z^f^.t&i^z^cr?  Treasurer. 

Warsaw   &    Rockford    Railroad   receipt,    1854. 

101 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX   /).  HAUBERG 

of  way  was  through  a  lot  of  sand  holes  and  if  it  was 
not  sand  it  was  swamp.  I  think  the  men  who  opposed 
their  getting  the  loans  for  buying  the  iron  for  the 
track  used  that  as  an  argument ;  that  the  country  that 
the  road  went  through  was  non  productive  and  that 
the  road  in  the  end  would  be  a  failure. 

They  had  the  grade  finished,  bridges  built  and  the 
ties  laid.  They  had  the  promise  of  money  to  buy  the 
rails  but  when  it  came  time  to  get  it,  it  was  refused 
them.  Steel  or  iron  rails  were  not  made  in  this 
country  at  that  time.  It  had  to  be  imported  from 
England.  It  was  generally  thought  that  the  Chicago 
&  Rock  Island  railroad  officials  had  something  to  do 
with  knocking  the  Sterling  &  Rock  Island  road  in  the 
head. 

All  the  farmers  around  here  were  asked  to  buy  stock, 
and  a  great  many  took  some.  Father  subscribed 
$400.00.  At  first  it  was  the  "Warsaw  &  Rockford" 
and  they  were  selling  subscriptions  for  that  in  1854, 
but  later  it  was  known  as  the  "Sterling  &  Rock  Island 
Railroad  Co.",  and  subscriptions  were  taken  for  that 
in  1857. 

When  the  rairoad  fell  through  with,  the  farmers 
refused  to  pay  the  notes  they  had  given.  Suit  was 
brought  against  a  lot  of  them  in  the  Circuit  Court 
at  Rock  Island  and  they  had  to  settle.  The  farmers 
accused  the  promoters  of  stealing  the  money  as  the 
reason  why  they  refused  to  pay  up,  but  the  promoters 
did  not  steal.  They  simply  could  not  get  the  money 
nil' 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  HAUBERQ 

necessary  to  buy  the  rails  and  rolling  stock.  "Squire 
Bill"  Marshall  and  Jim  Abbott  were  among  the  pro- 
moters, both  Cordova  men.  "Squire  Bill"  Marshall 
showed  me  the  papers  giving  him  the  right,  by  Act 
of  congress,  to  build  a  bridge  across  the  Mississippi  at 
Cordova. 

They  worked  summer  and  winter  to  build  the  rail- 
road grade.  In  the  summer  it  was  all  wheelbarrow 
work.  No  horses  were  used.  They  worked  wherever 
it  was  dry  enough.  In  winter  they  built  the  grade 
through  the  swamps.  They  got  dirt  from  the  high 
bank  about  forty  rods  or  so  southeast  of  where  the 
big  cave  is,  in  section  1,  Coe  township,  and  hauled  it 
with  horses  and  wagons  over  the  frozen  ground  and 
ice.  The  men  had  their  camp  where  the  stone  house 
is  now;  in  the  southwest  quarter  of  the  northeast 
quarter  of  section  one.  The  stone  house  was  after- 
wards built  by  "Gooseneck"  John  Marshall. 

Some  of  this  railroad  grade  came  in  handy,  later, 
when  they  used  part  of  it  for  a  public  wagon  road 
from  Philleo's  Island,  at  the  Middle  Crossing,  east- 
ward, toward  Erie. 

During  the  latter  part  of  September  1859  I  took  a 
load  of  garden  truck  to  Moline  and  peddled  it.  — 
There  were  no  professional  gardeners  there  then  — 
and  I  stayed  all  night  at  the  Western  House.  Charley 
Reese  and  Hans  Beckman  were  the  proprietors  — 
both  young  men.  I  was  late  getting  in.  When  I  had 
my  team  put  up  I  went  in  and  told  Mr.  Reese  I  wanted 
supper.  103 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX   D.  IIAUBERG 

"All  right ;  come  right  in,"  he  said. 

When  we  got  in  the  dining  room  there  were  three 
ladies  sitting  at  the  table,  eating.  Reese  said,  "This 
man  wants  his  supper.  He  is  a  farmer."  I  knew  what 
that  meant  —  "He's  a  fool."  Farmers  were  all  fools 
those  days,  in  the  eyes  of  the  townspeople.  The  ladies 
made  all  sorts  of  fun  of  me.  I  made  up  my  mind  I 
would  act  like  a  farmer.  When  they  put  in  a  word 
of  English,  I  did  not  understand;  I  was  green  —  right 
from  the  old  country.  They  asked  me  if  I  could  dance. 
"Oh,  I  hop  around  a  little,"  I  said.  One  of  the  ladies 
said,  "We  are  going  to  have  a  dance  here  next  Satur- 
day evening;  you  had  better  come  down." 

"No,  you  know  I  live  in  the  country  and  we  are  a 
little  clodfooted.  If  I  should  ask  you  for  a  dance  and 
then  step  on  your  toes  a  little,  you  would  run  away  and 
leave  me  standing  there  and  the  other  fellows  would 
laugh  at  me.     No,  I  gues  I  won't  come,"  I  said. 

"I  would  not  do  that,"  she  said,  "you  had  better 
come." 

"Well,  if  you  will  promise  not  to  run  away,  I'll  come" 
and  I  came. 

The  next  Saturday  I  went  down  with  another  load 
of  garden  truck,  sold  out  and  stayed  at  the  Western 
House  again,  where  the  dance  was  going  to  be.  I  was 
late  again  and  had  to  eat  with  the  ladies.  "You  see 
I'm  here,"  I  said  to  the  girl.  "I  see,"  she  said,  "and 
[  am  glad  you  came."    I  don't  think  she  meant  it. 

After  supper  I  went  into  the  hall,  or  bar-room  — 

1U4 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  I).  EAVBERG 

they  were  both  in  one  room  about  forty  feet  square. 
The  building  was  owned  by  C.  H.  Dibbern.  The  hall 
was  full  of  men  and  I  did  not  know  a  soul.  The  were 
all  Germans,  who  were  repairing  the  stone  and  brush 
dam  across  the  slough  from  the  main  land  to  the  island. 
The  first  public  work  that  was  done  here  was  done  by 
Germans;  afterwards  came  the  Irish. 

I  sat  down  on  a  bench  —  there  were  benches  all 
around  the  hall  —  and  a  fellow  came  and  shook  hands 
with  me.  He  had  worked  for  me  during  the  harvest. 
"Mark,"  he  said,  "I  am  glad  you  are  here ;  we  are 
going  to  have  a  dance  tonight."  "That  is  what  I  came 
for,"  I  said.  Then  some  one  called  him  away  —  to 
find  out  who  I  was,  I  guess  —  and  when  they  found 
out,  one  of  the  fellows  sat  down  beside  me.  "Are  you 
a  farmer?"  he  said. 

"Yes,  I  am  a  farmer." 

"You  must  set  'em  up  to  the  fellows,  then  they  won't 
whip  you,"  he  said. 

"They  won't  whip  me,"  I  said. 

"Yes,  they  will." 

"No,  they  wont." 

"What  makes  you  think  they  won't  whip  you?"  he 
said. 

"I  won't  hold  still,"  I  said. 

"Do  you  think  you  can  whip  that  whole  crowd?" 

"I  can  if  I  have  to." 

He  told  the  fellows  what  I  said,  and  added,  "He 
is  crazy."     Then   the   other  fellows  came   and   made 

105 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  JIM  HERO 

fun  of  me.  When  they  put  in  a  word  of  English,  I 
did  not  understand.  One  fellow  asked,  "Are  you  a  far- 
mer?" Another  fellow  said,  "That  is  a  great  question 
to  ask  —  if  he  is  a  farmer  —  look  at  his  feet,  that  will 
tell  you."  He  said,  "Say,  if  I  had  a  farm  I  would  like 
to  have  him  for  my  hired  man.  I  bet  there  are  no 
clods  where  he  comes  from." 

"Say,  don't  talk  that  way,  he  came  here  to  dance." 

"Dance,  nothing.  Ladies  in  Moline  don't  disgrace 
themselves  to  dance  with  farmers." 

During  the  time  all  this  talking  was  going  on,  old 
man  Dibbern  had  come  in.  One  of  the  fellows  went 
up  to  hirn  and  said,  "Father  Dibbern,  we  are  having 
some  fun;  we  have  a  green  farmer  here  who  just  came 
from  Deutchland." 

"Have  you?"  Dibbern  said. 

"Yes,  that  fellow  with  the  gray  hat  sitting  over 
there;  do  you  see  him?" 

"Yes,  I  see  the  fellow  with  gray  hat,  but  he  isn't 
green." 

"Yes,  he  is,"  the  fellow  said,  "he  can't  speak  a  word 
of  English." 

"That  is  Marx  Hauberg,"  Mr.  Dibbern  said.  "Have 
you  fellows  been  making  fun  of  him?  He  was  raised 
in  this  town ;  he  can  speak  English  better  than  Ger- 
man." 

"No ;  you  don't  know  him,"  the  fellow  said. 

"Yes,  I  do"  said  Dibbern.  "If  you  fellows  make 
106 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  l>.  HAUBERG 

fun  of  him,  he  won't  take  that  home ;  he  will  whip  you 
fellows  before  he  goes  home.' 

Just  then  Charles  Deere  and  four  or  five  fellows 
came  in,  about  half  shot.  Charles  says,  "Mark,  what 
in  hell  are  you  doing  here?" 

I  said,  "I'm  going  to  teach  those  fellows  some  man- 
ners to-night." 

"I  guess  you  can  do  it,"  Charley  said. 

"You  d — n  right,"  I  said,  "and  I'm  going  to." 

"Come  on,  we'll  have  something,"  Charley  said.  We 
had  something. 

"Mark,  if  you  think  you  need  any  help,  we  will  stay," 
Charley  said. 

"I  don't  need  any;  I  am  good  for  this  crowd." 

"I  guess  you  are,"  Phil  Williams  said. 

These  fellows  were  the  toughs  of  Moline ;  they  were 
my  friends ;  maybe  I  wasn't  any  better. 

When  the  musicians  came  they  shook  hands  with 
me  and  the  leader  said,  "Mark,  if  you  want  a  partner, 
get  around  in  time;  ladies  are  scarce  in  this  town." 
I  said  to  him,  "Give  me  a  tick  on  the  board  before  you 
begin  to  play ;  I'll  set  'em  up  to  you  after  a  while." 
When  the  tick  on  the  board  came  I  went  to  the  fellow 
that  told  me  the  ladies  in  Moline  would  not  disgrace 
themselves  to  dance  with  farmers  ,  and  asked  him 
to  show  me  the  ladies'  room.  He  says  in  plain  English, 
"You  go  to  Hell." 

"I  think  you  will  be  there  before  I  will,"  I  said. 
I  got  my  gentleman  by  the  neck  and  shoved  him  to 

107 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  I).  HAVBERG 

the  door  of  the  dining  room,  where  they  went  upstairs. 
When  we  got  in  the  dining  room  I  locked  the  door 
and  told  him  if  he  misled  me  he  would  never  see  day- 
light again. 

"Come  on",  he  said  and  we  went  upstairs.  He 
opened  the  door  and  said,  "This  is  the  place"  —  a 
perfect  gentleman.  The  first  lady  at  the  door  I  asked 
very  politely  for  a  dance.  She  got  up  and  came  with 
me.  When  we  got  to  the  dining  room  door  she  said. 
"There  is  no  room  to  dance ;  the  place  is  full  of  men." 

I  got  a  better  hold  of  her  arm  and  said,  "Come  on, 
we  will  make  room."  When  we  got  in  the  middle  of 
the  hall  I  pushed  some  of  the  fellows  aside  (the  first 
dance  was  a  waltz)  and  when  we  had  room  enough  we 
began  to  turn  around.  She  was  a  good  dancer.  I 
stepped  on  everybody's  toes  that  was  in  the  way.  We 
were  the  only  couple  who  danced. 

When  the  dance  was  over,  I  said  to  her,  "It  is  em- 
barrassing for  you  to  sit  here  all  alone,  so  if  my  com- 
pany is  acceptable,  I  will  amuse  you  the  best  I  know 
how." 

"All  right,"  she  said,  "what  is  your  name?"  I  told 
her. 

"Why,  this  is  a  Godsend,"  she  said,  "we  came  here 
to  America  upon  the  recommendation  of  your  father 
and  mother.  We  have  been  here  more  than  three 
months  and  have  not  been  able  to  find  them." 

We  danced  the  next  dance  together.  When  the  dance 
108 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  HAVBERG 

was  over,  her  mother  was  there  and  she  said  to  her, 
"Mother,  this  is  John  Hauberg's  son." 

"What  was  you  mother's  maiden  name?"  said  the 
mother. 

"Margretha  Griese,"  I  said. 
"My,"  she  said,  "father  come  here  —  father  was  close 
by  —  this  is  John  Hauberg's  son." 

"How  big  is  your  father?"  he  said. 

"About  your  size." 

"What  kind  of  hair  has  he?" 

"He  has  dark  curly  hair,"  I  said. 

"Was  he  a  soldier?" 

"Yes." 

"Was  he  in  the  Cavalry?"  he  asked. 

"He  was." 

"Mother  come,"  he  said,  "and  Doris  you  bring  the 
young  man,  we  will  have  a  drink  on  this,"  and  we  did. 
Then  the  old  man  said,  "Are  you  the  farmer  these  fel- 
lows are  going  to  lick?" 

"Yes,"  I  said,  "if  they  can." 

"You  don't  think  they  can?" 

"No,"  I  said,  "I  am  going  to  teach  these  fellows 
enough  so  that  when  a  stranger  comes  hereafter  they 
will  know  enough  to  respect  him." 

"I  see  you  are  ready  for  them.  You  have  taken  off 
your  coat  and  your  necktie  and  collar,"  he  said. 

We  had  had  about  seven  dances  when  the  ladies  in 
the  house  came  down.  When  "Ladies'  choice"  was 
called,  the  girl  of  the  house  who  had  invited  me,  sat 

109 


MEMO  I  lis   OF  MARX    D.    HAVBERG 

down  beside  the  girl  I  had  danced  with.  The  girl 
of  the  house  said,  ''Did  they  call  out  'Ladies'  choice'?" 

"Yes,"  said  the  girl  I  had  danced  with. 

"Well,  I  will  get  that  farmer,  I  invited  him." 

"You  are  too  late;  that  is  my  fellow,"  said  the  girl 
I  had  danced  with. 

"Can  he  dance?" 

"Yes,  the  best  in  the  house." 

"He  told  me  he  could  just  hop  around  a  little.  Well, 
you  get  him  first  and  bring  him  here  to  me.  I  invited 
him  and  I  don't  want  to  go  back  on  him." 

I  heard  what  they  said,  so  I  went  to  the  fellows  — 
they  were  all  in  a  bunch  —  and  said.  "Say,  you  fel- 
lows look  to  me  as  if  you  were  strangers  here.  Come 
on,  one  of  you,  and  I  will  give  you  an  introduction  to 
my  lady  and  you  can  have  a  dance."  Then  war  broke 
out.  They  rushed  at  me  and  as  many  as  could,  got 
hold  of  me,  and  were  in  one  anothers  way.  I  got  hold 
of  one  fellow  —  a  side  hold  — and  tripped  him.  He 
fell  flat  on  his  back.  He  took  part  of  my  vest  along. 
The  fellow  next  to  him  I  hit  and  kicked.  He  fell  back- 
wards, right  over  the  first  fellow,  and  broke  his  front 
teeth.  He  took  a  piece  of  my  shirt  along.  The  next 
man,  when  he  fell,  took  the  rest  of  my  vest  and  shirt 
along.  He  fell  with  his  head  against  the  sharp  edge 
of  the  counter  and  got  a  bad  cut  in  the  back  of  his  head. 
The  next  man  I  hit  right  in  the  eye.  That  was  the  end 
of  the  battle,  just  then. 

I  found  out  later  that  some  of  the  fellows  there  that 
no 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  J).  JfM  BERG 

night  were  my  friends.  They  had  been  treated  like 
I  was  and  they  sicked  these  fellows  on  to  me  for  re- 
venge, thinking  I  could  put  it  over  them.  There  was 
a  bully  in  town  and  they  had  gone  after  him,  one  of 
these  friends  told  me.  He  described  him  to  me  and 
said,  "Take  him  in  time.  He  is  a  blacksmith,  working 
for  John  Deere." 

When  he  came  in  I  happened  to  face  the  door.  He 
was  a  little  square-shouldered  fellow.  He  made  a  rush 
for  me,  to  stick  his  head  between  my  legs  and  throw 
me  over  backwards;  but  he  was  too  light.  I  picked 
him  up  and  threw  him  out  of  the  window.  That 
ended  the  fight  for  all  time  with  the  farmers.  There 
had  been  a  dance  there  in  June  and  the  farmers  had 
been  made  to  treat,  and  when  their  money  was  all  gone, 
they  shoved  them  out  doors.  The  Fourth  of  July 
there  had  been  a  dance  there  and  farmers  from  Hamp- 
ton and  from  our  way  were  there.  When  they  had 
spent  all  their  money  they  boxed  their  ears  and  told 
them  to  go  home.  They  were  pretty  badly  spoiled 
down  there  in  the  city. 

Well,  I  borrowed  a  shirt  from  Charley  Reese  and 
danced  —  everybody  was  happy  —  as  if  nothing  had 
happened.  "Son,  well  done,"  said  the  old  man.  His 
name  was  Gurius.  James  Loptien  married  his  daught- 
er Doris.  One  of  the  three  ladies  of  the  house  was 
Mrs.  Speck,  Claus  Reimers'  mother-in-law.  Hans 
Mumm  married  one  of  them,  Dr.  Robert  C.  J.  Meyers' 
mother-inlaw.     What  became  of  the  other  lady  I  don't 

111 


MEMOIRS   OF  MANX  D.   HAUBERO 

know.  I  offered  to  pay  Mr.  Dibbern  for  the  window 
the  next  morning,  but  he  would  not  take  any  pay.  He 
said,  "I  am  glad  that  it  came  out  as  it  did." 

The  foregoing  all  happened  on  my  twenty-second 
birthday.  The  next  morning,  when  I  was  hitching 
up  to  go  home,  I  got  an  invitation  to  a  wedding.  I 
put  my  team  back  in  the  barn  and  went  to  the  wedding. 
The  man  who  was  married  had  staid  at  our  home  when 
we  lived  in  Moline.  Monday  morning,  the  morning 
after  the  wedding,  I  had  my  team  hitched  up,  when  the 
constable  came  and  arrested  me  for  trying  to  commit 
manslaughter.  The  other  fellow  had  a  lawyer;  I  did 
not.  When  we  got  into  Court  the  Squire  read  the  war- 
rant and  asked  me  if  I  plead  guilty.  I  said,  "No,  sir, 
I  don't."  Then  the  lawyer  got  up  and  told  the  Court 
what  I  had  done  and  what  he  could  prove,  and  what 
ought  to  be  done  with  me.  When  he  was  through  the 
Squire  asked  me  if  I  had  anything  to  say.  I  said,  "No, 
I  think  he  said  enough."  Then  he  swore  the  witnesses 
and  the  interpreter. 

When  the  lawyer  got  through  with  the  witness,  he 
said  to  me,  "You  can  take  the  witness."  I  asked  the 
witness  how  it  come  that  I  hit  him.  "Didn't  you  poke 
your  finger  under  my  nose  to  see  how  good  looking  I 
was?"  Then  the  lawyer  said,  "I  object  to  the  ques- 
tion." Then  I  got  up  and  said,  "Squire,  do  you  think 
there  is  anybody  in  this  country  brute  enough  to  hit 
anyone  in  the  face  without  provocation?"  The  Squire 
said,  "Answer  the  question."     The  fellow  did  answer 

112 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  I).   II  \l  BERG 

it,  but  it  was  hard  work.  I  think  the  interpreter  was 
a  little  on  my  side ;  we  had  things  about  our  own  way. 
The  Dutch  could  not  understand  English  and  the  Eng- 
lish could  not  understand  Dutch.  Every  witness  was 
about  like  the  first  one.  The  lawyer  said,  "Your 
Honor,  this  is  our  case."  I  said,  "This  is  my  case." 
When  the  lawyer  got  up  to  make  his  plea  he  called  me 
everything  he  could  lay  his  tongue  to.  When  he  sat 
down,  I  got  up. 

I  said,  "Squire,  these  fellows  are  my  conutrymen. 
They  are  good  fellows.  They  don't  look  very  good 
now,  but  they  will  look  better  after  a  while.  They 
came  from  a  country  where  they  are  compelled  to  re- 
spect people,  they  came  to  America,  a  free  country. 
They  think,  'I  can  do  as  I  please,'  and  they  pleased  to 
make  fun  of  me.  There  is  a  certain  amount  of  nigger 
about  these  fellows,  that  has  to  be  knocked  out ;  when 
that  is  knocked  out,  they  are  all  right  and  become  good 
citizens  and  know  enough  to  respect  strangers.  If 
they  have  not  learned  that  this  time,  I  can  come  back 
and  give  them  another  lesson.  Now  Squire,  if  you 
think  I  am  guilty,  put  on  the  fine ;  I  have  the  money 
in  my  pocket  to  pay  it." 

When  the  lawyer  got  up  again  he  put  it  over  me  in 
good  shape.  He  said  I  ought  to  be  put  behind  the  bars ; 
I  was  a  dangerous  man  to  be  left  loose  over  the  country. 
"He'll  kill  somebody." 

When  the  lawyer  sat  down,  the  Squire  said  to  me, 
"I  fine  you  one  dollar." 

113 

Memoirs.     8. 


MEMOIRS   OF  MARX   D.   HAUBERG 

"How  much  is  the  cost?"  I  said. 

"I  will  remit  my  cost,"  he  said. 

"How  much  is  your  cost,  Mr.  Stevens?"  Mr.  Stev- 
ens was  the  constable. 

"Mark,  I  don't  want  anything,"  Mr.  Stevens  said, 
"I  think  you  did  the  right  thing." 

I  got  out  my  dollar,  the  Squire  gave  me  a  receipt 
and  said,  "Mark,  Mrs.  Swander  wants  to  see  you  to 
dinner  at  our  house."  I  said  "All  right."  Mr.  Swan- 
der was  the  Squire.  He  was  our  neighbor  and  bought 
our  house  when  we  left  Moline.  Mrs.  Swander  was 
glad  to  see  me  and  asked  me  if  I  had  been  in  the  lockup. 
After  dinner  Mr.  Swander  and  I  went  down  town  in 
a  saloon,  and  there  was  the  lawyer.  He  came  up  to 
me  and  said,  "Shake,  I  thought  you  were  a  stranger 
here.  Say,  by  gad,  you've  got  the  nerve  all  right; 
where  did  you  get  your  education?"  I  said,  "Driving 
oxen  to  a  breaking  plow"  in  Scott  County,  Iowa. 

I  rented  the  eighty  acres  where  George  Guinn  now 
lives,  from  Richard  Torpin  in  the  spring.  I  had  hired 
a  man  and  his  wife  for  $180.00  a  year,  to  work  for  me. 
He  was  a  good  man ;  but  she  was  no  good.  We  did  not 
have  a  decent  meal  while  she  was  there.  She  never 
had  meals  ready  when  we  came  in.  I  got  them  from 
Davenport  in  March  and  I  told  him  I  would  give  him 
the  $180.00  now  if  he  would  take  his  wife  and  get 
out;  I  said  I  could  not  stand  it  any  longer.  He  said, 
"All  right,  take  us  down";  and  I  did  in  December. 
Then  I  batched  again  until  next  spring. 

114 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  HAl  BERO 

I  bought  another  span  of  horses,  harness  and  wagon 
for  two  hundred  and  seventy-seven  dollars  and  fifty 
cents,  for  which  I  paid  cash.  Then  we  had  two  of  the 
best  teams  in  the  country — one  pair  of  chestnut  sorrel, 
weighing  about  twenty-eight  hundred  and  a  span  of 
bays  weighing  about  thirty  hundred. 

When  we  had  sold  our  grain  and  paid  out  the  money, 
we  were  about  $600.00  in  debt.  We  had  had  extremely 
bad  luck,  but  we  were  not  discouraged.  My  sow  had 
six  pigs.  I  had  bought  a  new  reaper  to  cut  the  grain, 
for  one  hundred  and  sixty  dollars.  We  now  had  a  full 
stock  of  implements,  feed  and  seed,  and  good  teams. 

One  Sunday  morning  in  December,  our  neighbor 
woman  came  over  and  said  to  me,  "Mr.  Hauberg,  my 
John  is  sick;  I  want  you  to  come  and  see  what  is  the 
matter  with  him." 

"Is  he  in  bed?"  I  asked. 

"Yes." 

"Mother,"  I  said,  "I  don't  know  anything  about  sick 
people;  if  he  is  in  bed,  you  better  have  a  doctor.  "It 
is  too  cold  for  you  to  go,"  I  said,  "but  I  will  go  to  town 
and  get  one." 

"I  don't  want  a  town  doctor;  I  want  you." 

"I  can't  do  him  any  good,"  I  said. 

"You  can't  put  me  off  like  that,"  she  said,  "every- 
body says  you  are  smart;  I  wont  go  home  until  you 
come  with  me." 

I  went  with  her.  When  we  got  there  John  lay  in 
bed  like  he  was  dead.     I  went  through  the  perform- 

115 


MEMOIRS   OF  MARX  D.  HAUBERG 

ance  of  a  doctor  and  then  stood  back  and  looked  at  him. 

''Mother,"  I  said,  "there  is  nothing  the  matter  with 
him,  except  you  don't  feed  him  good  enough." 

"Yes,  I  do,"  she  said. 

"No,  you  do  not,"  I  said,  "if  you  don't  feed  him 
better  he  will  die." 

"Well,  John,"  she  said,  "if  I  thought  you  would  get 
well  again  I  would  kill  a  chicken  for  you."  (I  think 
she  killed  the  chicken  and  he  got  well.) 

At  about  the  same  time,  a. man  living  about  four 
miles  south  of  here  came  over  and  wanted  me  to  go 
with  him  to  Rock  Island  and  see  if  the  title  to  a  piece 
of  land  he  had  bought  was  all  right.  His  wife  had  to 
come  too.  Going  down  the  River  road  from  Port  By- 
ran  to  Hampton  was  very  cold  and  the  wife  said,  "Wil- 
liam, when  we  get  to  Hampton  we  will  stop  at  our 
friend's  house;  I  am  afraid  the  baby  will  freeze.  I 
can't  wrap  him  up  any  more  for  then  he  will  smother 
When  we  got  to  the  friend's  house,  I  said  to  him,  "You 
help  your  wife,  I  will  take  care  of  the  oxen." 

Before  they  reached  the  house  the  lady  came  out 
and  said,  "My  man  is  dead — he  was  buried  last  Thurs- 
day— and  now  what  shall  I  do?"  I  have  only  a  little 
money ;  I  am  a  poor  woman,  and  have  only  a  little 
flour  and  potatoes  left."  Tears  as  big  as  peas  ran 
down  her  cheeks.  When  she  got  out  of  breath,  Wil- 
liam said,  "What  is  the  matter  wih  you?  That  old 
man  was  old ;  he  could  not  do  you,  nor  the  world,  any 
good.  You  are  young  yet  and  pretty  good  looking; 
no 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  HAVBERG 

you  will  find  somebody  to  take  care  of  you  better  than 
that  old  fellow;"  when  all  of  a  sudden  she  got  a  smile 
on  her  face  and  said :  "Two  have  already  asked  me 
and  one  has  a  little  farm  on  the  bluff  here ;  I  guess  I 
will  take  him;"  and  she  did.  (I  will  not  tell  any 
names.  The  children  are  living  yet  and  I  might  get 
into  a  hornet's  nest). 

In  the  spring  of  1860  I  hired  a  married  woman, 
who  had  a  little  girl,  to  work  for  me,  for  forty  dollars 
a  year.  Her  husband  made  his  home  with  us  when 
he  was  out  of  work.  He  worked  for  Henry  Ashdown 
— Ed  Ashdown's  father.  We  had  two  hired  men,  each 
of  whom  we  paid  $16.00  per  month.  Brother  Dave 
was  not  able  to  work.  He  drove  the  horses  to  the 
reaper  in  harvest.  We  raised  a  good  crop.  We  had 
7100  bushels  of  grain — over  4000  bushels  of  wheat — 

and  sold  it,  in  time  to Shepard,  of  Port  Byron, 

who  had  a  flour  mill,  for  75  cents  a  bushel.  We  fat- 
tened our  oxen  with  pumpkins  and  butchered  them.  I 
butchered  a  beef  every  week  after  harvest  and  until 
it  froze  up  in  the  fall  and  peddled  it.  I  bought  cattle 
to  butcher  and  to  keep. 

After  we  had  sold  our  grain  we  paid  our  debts,  and 
had  some  money  left.  Some  of  the  old  fellows  around 
there  who  had  been  saying,  "There's  something  wrong 
in  the  upper  story  with  that  young  man,"  came  'round 
now  and  borrowed  money  to  pay  interest. 

In  the  winter  of  1861  we  bought  another  span  of 
horses  for  $160.00  and  rented  the  eighty  acres  again 

117 


MEMOIRS   OF  MARX   D.   HAVBERG 

from  Mr.  Torpin.  We  had  a  fair  crop  this  year.  After 
paying  rent  and  expenses  we  had  about  $600  for  our 
work. 

When  hauling  wheat  to  Port  Byron,  Archie  Allen, 
who  lived  a  mile  above  Port  Byron,  on  the  river  road, 
would  ride  with  me  and  tell  me  how  they  did  when  he 
came  here.  He  came  in  the  late  Twenties.  He  said 
they  shot  a  deer,  standing  in  the  door  of  his  house. 
He  said,  "Neighbor  Clark  and  I  (Neighbor  Clark  lived 
in  what  is  now  the  city  of  Rock  Island)  had  a  plow  in 
company,  with  iron  share  and  wooden  moldboard.  If 
Neighbor  Clark  had  it  and  I  wanted  to  use  it  I  would 
go  down  and  get  it  and  carry  it  home  on  my  back, 
When  I  had  it  and  was  done  with  it,  Neighbor  Clark 
would  get  it  and  carry  it  home." 

"How  did  you  know  when  he  was  done  with  it,"  I 
asked? 

"We  would  always  tell  when  we  would  be  done  with 
it.  One  time  Neighbor  Clark  invited  me  and  my 
woman  down  to  Christmas  dinner  and  we  went  down. 
When  we  got  to  the  creek — you  know,  this  side  of  Mc- 
Neal's — in  Watertown?" 

"Yes?" 

"Well,  it  had  been  raining  some  days  before  this  and 
the  creek  had  been  high  and  a  scum  of  ice  had  frozen 
over  before  the  water  went  down,  and  the  ice  would 
not  hold  us.  I  could  jump  it,  but  my  woman  could  not 
span  it,  so  I  cut  some  saplings  and  threw  them  across. 
I  went  back  and  she  stepped  out  as  far  as  she  could, 
us 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX   D.  II  U  BERQ 

and  I  got  hold  of  her  hand  and  pulled  her  over.  (The 
creek  was  where  Watertown  is  now).  Well,  we  got 
down  there  about  11:0  o'clock   .    .    .    ." 

"Where  did  you  get  the  ax  to  cut  the  saplings?"  I 
asked. 

"I  always  carried  a  hatchet  in  my  belt." 

"...  and  Neighbor  Clark  and  his  woman  were 
glad  to  see  us.  Clark  got  the  grubbing  hoe  and  went 
to  the  potato  patch  and  got  potatoes  for  dinner.  He 
had  shot  a  deer  and  turkey.  I  tell  you  we  had  a  fine 
dinner." 

"Wasn't  your  potatoes  kind  of  sweet,  having  been 
frozen?"  I  said. 

"No,  we  put  them  in  boiling  water  right  away ;  it 
doesn't  hurt  them." 

"Why  didn't  he  dig  his  potatoes  in  the  Fall?" 

"He  had  no  place  to  put  them ;  they  are  better  in  the 
ground." 

"We  stayed  all  night  and  went  home  the  next  day. 
Mark,  I  tell  you,  we  had  a  good  time.  When  we  got 
home  the  house  was  warm.  We  had  a  big  fire-place 
and  the  fire  was  burning.  I  went  out  to  feed  the  cat- 
tle; the  Indian  was  there.  He  would  come  around 
once  in  a  while.  He  had  been  feeding  the  cattle  and 
stayed  there  the  night  before." 

"Did  the  Indians  ever  bother  you  very  much?"  I 
asked. 

"No,  they  don't  bother  any.  They  come  and  camp 
here  sometimes  and  go.    No,  they  never  bothered  me." 

no 


MEMOIRS   OF  MARX  D.  HAH  BERG 


One  time  I  was  hauling  some  watermelons  to  Port 
Byron  with  oxen.  Sister  Doris  was  with  me.  We  took 
the  road  straight  west  from  Fairfield.  When  we  came 
down  the  hill,  above  the  limekiln,  the  oxen  saw  the 
water — the  road  at  that  time  was  close  to  the  river. 
It  was  a  hot  day.  I  kept  my  eye  on  them  and  they 
kept  their  eyes  on  me.  A  squirrel  ran  across  the  road 
and  I  looked  at  it.  In  an  instant  the  oxen  ran  for  the 
river;  all  my  hitting  them  over  the  head  was  of  no 
avail.     They  ran  right  into  the  river,  the  water  half 

way  to  their  backs, 
and  water  running 
into  the  wagon,  and 
Doris  sitting  on  the 
seat-board.  I  had  to 
wait  until  they  were 
cooled  off  before  I 
could  get  them  out. 
They  were  well  broke, 
so  when  I  went  down 
a  ways  and  told  them 
to  come  on,  they 
came.  I  was  afraid 
the  wagon  would  hit 
a  rock  and  upset  and 
drown  my  sister,  but 
it    all    came    out    all 

Si3ter    Doris    and    husband,    Gottlieb    Stilz.  *= 

120 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  If  M  BERG 

We  did  more  walking  those  days.  Many  a  time  I 
would  walk  from  Sugar  Grove  to  Moline  and  back,  or 
to  Hampton  Bluff  and  back,  and  we  often  walked  to 
where  the  Heeren's  lived,  which  was  not  so  far,  about 
seven  miles  one  way.  One  time  two  other  fellows  and 
I  walked  from  our  log  house  to  "Propstei,"  about  nine 
miles  northwest  of  Davenport.  We  got  there  at  three 
o'clock  in  the  afternoon.  We  went  to  attend  a  dance, 
about  35  miles.  It  was  dangerous  business  to  go  there. 
A  stranger  was  liable  to  get  into  a  knockdown.  I 
think  I  would  have  got  into  one  there  if  I  had  not  been 
so  bold.  They  had  a  different  twang  to  their  talk,  and 
our  language  was  different  so  they  always  noticed  it. 

The  girls  generally  did  not  walk  so  far.  It  was 
mostly  men  that  walked  the  long  distances.  I  would 
go  afoot  to  Port  Byron,  eight  miles,  to  get  the  mail 
rather  than  hitch  up  a  horse.  After  we  were  married 
my  wife  and  I  would  walk  a  couple  of  miles  or  more 
to  call  on  the  neighbors  and  would  carry  the  babies. 
In  later  life  I  generally  walked  to  Hillsdale,  six  miles 
to  catch  the  train  to  Rock  Island.  One  time  I  was  late 
and  I  walked  to  Barstow,  eleven  miles  farther,  and 
caught  the  Beardstown  train  into  Rock  Island  from 
there. 

A  few  days  before  Christmas  1860  I  took  a  hog  and 
one  turkey  to  Port  Byron.  I  offered  to  sell  the  hog 
for  $5.00  in  cash — it  weighed  two  hundred  and  sixty- 
five  pounds — and  could  not  get  it.  I  could  have  gotten 
$5.00  in  trade  at  the  store,  but  I  wanted  the  cash. 

121 


MEMOIRS   OF  MANX  D.   HAUBERG 


The  turkey  was  a  gobbler  weighing  twenty-two 
pounds.  I  wanted  fifty  cents  for  it.  I  could  not  get 
that.  It  was  dressed,  ready  to  put  in  the  pan.  I  took 
my  hog  and  turkey  home  again.  I  smoked  the  hams 
and  shoulders  and  salted  the  rest  of  the  hog,  later  sell- 
ing the  hams  for 
18  cents  a  pound.  I 
roasted  the  turkey 
and  invited  all  my 
young  friends  to 
help  eat  it. 

We  had  some  of 
the  best  times  of 
our  life  in  that  old 
log  house.  Brother 
Dave  and  I  were 
batching ;  we  had  no 
old  people  around, 
and  would  invite 
the  young  people  of 
the  neighborhood, 
and  dance  all  night, 
with  someone  play- 
ing an  accordion  or 
sometimes  only  a  comb.  Sometimes  we  used  mouth 
harmonicas  or  jews  harps,  but  we  could  not  dance  to 
a  jews  harp  because  it  was  not  loud  enough. 

When  the  war  broke  out,  most  of  the  men  of  our 
crowd  enlisted.    Our  log  house  was  their  headquarters. 


MY    SISTERS. 
I'ii .1  ti  left   to  right:  Catherine,   Margaret,  Elizabeth 


122 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  HAUBERO 

They  would  have  their  trunk  or  valise  at  our  house 
and  be  with  us  when  they  were  out  of  work.  Among 
them  were  Joe  Gravenhorst,  who  was  a  well-educated 
man,  cultured  and  a  good  singer  and  musician; 
Henry    Kahler  —  he    and    I    went    to    school    together 

in    Raisdorf,    Germany.     Lindau,  A.  B.  Shanks, 

Gustav  Stromer,  Charley  Roberts,  Claus  Steffen,  Fritz 
Wandschneider,  and  Peter  Wiese,  who  worked  for  us 
that  summer.  All  these  men  volunteered  for  three 
years'  service.  Jim  Kahler  was  afterwards  drafted. 
Stromer,  Roberts,  Steffen,  Wandschneider  and  Wiese 
enlisted  together  in  the  summer  of  1861.  I  took  them 
to  Port  Byron  with  a  four-horse  team.  We  wanted  to 
make  a  display.  They  joined  the  Fourth  Illinois  Cav- 
alry, Company  "M."  George  Dodge  of  Port  Byron 
was  captain  of  the  company.  George  Genung,  Sam 
Williamson,  and  George  Moore  of  Port  Byron  were  in 
this  company  also.  They  got  into  some  hard  going  at 
Fort  Henry  and  Donelson  and  at  Pittsburg  Landing, 
or  Shiloh,  as  they  also  call  it.  When  their  three  years' 
term  was  up,  the  five  men  that  I  took  to  Port  Byron 
enlisted  in  a  veteran  regiment,  all  except  Stromer, 
who  came  home  disabled. 

Captain  Dodge  told  me  afterwards  that  if  he  had  had 
a  regiment  like  Claus  Steffen  he  could  have  ridden  all 
through  the  South  with  them.  "I  could  have  raided 
h — 1  with  them,"  he  said.  Steffen  got  his  army  train- 
ing in  Germany  and  was  a  well-trained,  quick  and  in- 
telligent man.  Joe  Gravenhorst  was  commissioned  a 
captain  before  the  war  was  over.  12:; 


MEMOIRS   OF  MARX  D.  HAUBERG 

I  volunteered  three  times.  The  first  time  was  when 
the  call  came  for  75,000.  I  went  to  Davenport  to  en- 
list but  the  quota  was  filled.  I  was  not  even  examined. 
The  next  time  three  of  us  went  to  Sterling  to  try  our 
luck.  I  had  a  rupture,  and  the  other  two  had  some- 
thing wrong  with  them.  The  reason  we  went  so  far 
from  home  was  we  did  not  want  the  men  at  home  to 
have  the  laugh  on  us  if  they  knew  we  failed.  Neither 
of  us  was  accepted.  The  last  time  was  shortly  before 
I  was  married,  in  1862,  at  Rock  Island.  A  young 
doctor  examined  a  lot  of  us.  Dr.  Patrick  Gregg  was 
present  and  asked  the  young  doctor:  "How  many  did 
you  get  out  of  that  crowd?"  "Only  two,"  he  said. 
"What's  the  matter  with  that  fat  fellow?"  Dr.  Gregg 
asked.  The  young  doctor  told  him,  and  Gregg  asked 
me  to  strip.  He  said :  "Young  man,  you  are  in  very 
bad  shape.  Don't  leave  town  until  you  have  got  a 
truss." 

We  hired  Henry  Miller  of  Hampton  Bluff  to  work 
for  us  and  he  enlisted  also.  He  and  Gust  Klebe,  who 
also  was  from  Hampton  Bluff,  went  together.  They 
were  only  boys  of  about  seventeen  years.   Fred  Broady 

and  Henry  Frels  and  Schultz  went  together. 

The  last  two  named  never  came  back.  Henry  Frels 
was  sitting  on  a  log  with  several  of  his  comrades.  A 
rebel  tried  to  get  the  whole  line  in  one  shot  but  missed 
all  of  them  except  Henry.  He  was  leaning  back  a  little 
further  than  the  others  and  got  wounded  in  the  neck. 
It  was  only  a  flesh  wound  and  he  would  not  go  to 

124 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  J>.  JIM  BERG 


a  hospital  with  it. 
Gangrene  set  in  in 
a  few  days  and  he 
died. 

When  Henry  Mil- 
ler enlisted  we  got 
Andrew  Stotmeister 
to  come  to  take  his 
place.  The  summer 
before  we  had  two 
harvest  hands  who 
went  to  war,  Charles 
Shuler  and  Nick 
Cumber.  They  were 
both  coopers  by 
trade.  Shuler  lost 
his  life  in  the  war. 

The  men  who  went 
to  war  directly  from 
our  house  was  the 
largest  lot  from  any  one  place  in  our  township,  but 
the  Adam  Ziegler's  had  a  family  record  that  probably 
was  the  biggest  in  the  United  States.  They  had  seven 
sons  in  the  war,  and  all  volunteers.  They  were  Dave, 
Solomon,  John,  Bill,  Charley,  Ben  and  Nick.  All  nice 
boys.  All  of  them  came  back  safe  and  sound.  When 
Judge  W.  H.  Gest  was  in  congress  he  got  a  special  bill 
through  congress  giving  the  mother  of  these  boys  a 
widow's  pension.  She  could  not  get  a  pension  under 
the  general  pension  laws.  125 


BROTHER    DAVE   AND  WIFE 
and    their    first    child.    John    D.    G. 


MEMOIRS   OF  MARX  D.  HAUBERG 

Toward  the  last  about  all  the  loose-footed  men  had 
gone  to  war  and  we  were  hard  up  for  men  to  do  the 
necessary  farm  work,  and  when  they  started  the  draft, 
we  formed  a  club  at  Bluff  School.  I  was  one  of  the 
officers,  and  they  had  one  at  Enterprise  school  in  Ca- 
noe Creek  Township  also,  and  when  a  member  of  the 
club  was  drafted  we  would  all  chip  in  together  and 
buy  a  substitute.  We  bought  one.  I  think  we  paid 
$700.00  for  him.  They  got  a  negro  in  Davenport  to 
go.  They  would  dicker  over  the  price  to  be  paid,  and 
some  got  $500.00,  and  some  got  as  high  as  $1000.00; 
There  were  men  in  the  cities  who  made  it  a  business 
to  get  substitutes,  something  like  an  employment  bu- 
reau to-day.  We  were  getting  our  harvesting  done  by 
several  farm  owners  or  renters  getting  together  so  as 
to  have  a  crew.  We  did  not  have  self-binders  at  that 
time.     All  the  grain  had  to  be  bound  by  hand. 

A  law  was  passed  by  congress  early  in  1865,  when 
the  draft  was  on,  which  gave  a  township  the  right  to 
vote  a  tax  to  pay  bounties  for  substitutes.  At  that 
time  every  township  was  held  responsible  for  raising 
so  many  men,  according  to  its  population.  Coe  town 
took  a  vote  on  it  and  it  carried  nearly  two  to  one.  It 
was  mentioned  as  a  joke  on  Adam  Ziegler.  He  had 
seven  sons  already  in  the  war,  and  now  would  have  to 
pay  extra  taxes  to  send  substitutes. 

Coe  town  had  no  post  office,  and  whenever  any  of 
our  men  enlisted  they  would  give  their  post-office  ad- 
dress,  which   was  always  some  place  outside   of  the 

126 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  I).  JIM  BERG 

township,  and  we  did  not  get  the  credit  we  should  have 
had.  Canoe  Creek  township  claimed  that  their  popu- 
lation was  less  than  the  figures  used  to  make  up  their 
quota.  They  claimed  that  every  stranger  that  had 
been  in  the  township  to  hunt  on  the  Docia  for  the  last 
ten  years  had  been  counted  as  part  of  their  regular 
citizens. 

We  did  not  have  as  many  campaigns  for  money  as 
we  had  in  the  war  with  Germany,  but  we  did  raise 
funds  for  aiding  the  wounded,  etc.  Jennie  Ann  Tor- 
pin  was  good  at  collecting  for  such  purposes,  and  she 
got  some  good  amounts  from  some  of  us.  I  paid  her 
$90.00  in  one  sum. 

We  got  some  interesting  letters  from  the  men  that 
went  from  our  crowd.  I  will  copy  one  of  them  here,  to 
show  how  the  men  felt  about  their  army  service,  and 
their  opinion  about  what  turn  things  would  take.  This 
letter  is  translated  from  the  German  language,  as 
follows : 

Colliersville,  June  12,  '63. 

Dear  Friend  Hauberg: — 

It  has  been  so  long  a  time  since  I  wrote  you,  and 
still  longer  since  I  heard  from  you.  Therefore  I  am 
going  to  write  a  few  lines,  and  learn  how  it  goes  with 
you  and  your  family,  and  in  fact,  all  our  acquaintances 
on  the  Prairie;  whether  you  are  all  living  and  how 
things  are  progressing  with  you. 

With  us  all  is  still  as  of  old,  excepting  that  now, 
practically,  we  have  no  rest  day  or  night,  and  we  have 


MEMOIRS   OF  MANX  D.   HM  BERG 

got  to  spend  the  most  of  the  time  in  the  saddle.  Last 
night  the  "verdamten"  Rebels  again  tore  up  the  rail- 
road between  here  and  Germantown,  and  two  days  ago 
they  did  the  same  thing.  Our  Regiment  is  alone  here 
and  we  cannot  be  everywhere  at  the  same  time,  for 
we  have  to  guard  about  25  miles  of  railroad  with  out 
little  regiment  of  250  men,  all  told ;  and  we  have  to 
keep  our  rear  and  our  front  free  while  the  rebels  are 
continually  feeling  around,  and  yet  there  are  three 
regiments  of  cavalry  in  Germantown,  and  seven  or 
eight  regiments  of  cavalry  in  La  Grange,  who  lie  about 
and  observe  how  we  worry  around,  for  the  "verdam- 
ten" rebels  give  up  no  opportunity  for  a  fight,  but 
when  they  have  played  us  a  trick,  they  return  as  fast 
as  possible  across  Coldwater  river.  We  are  waiting 
daily  for  orders  to  go  to  Vicksburg  or  on  a  raid  in 
Mississippi  for  a  change.  One  of  the  two  would  do 
for  a  change,  for  our  horses  are  now  in  good  order, 
and  the  men  in  good  health,  and  it  is  time  that  we 
should  be  burning  the  wheat  which  is  now  being  har- 
vested in  Mississippi,  for  certainly  by  fall  there  will 
be  no  more  left,  for  by  that  time  the  rebels  will  have 
impressed  all  for  their  arms. 

The  weather  is  becoming  unpleasant,  warm — or  as 
one  might  say,  hot ;  and  Peter,  Charley,  Gustave  Stro- 
mer  and  I  have  built  us  a  little  "Irishman's  shanty," 
so  that  in  case  we  should  remain  here  through  the 
summer,  we  will  not  need  to  lie  so  jammed  up  in  a  tent, 
and  we  can  have  everything  a  little  more  agreeable. 
128 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  HAUBERQ 

Christian  is  quite  well  this  summer  and  is  always 
the  first  when  anything  happens,  and  he  would  rather 
be  here  now  than  at  home  —  which  will  happen  soon, 
as  the  14  months  which  we  still  have,  will  pass  all  too 
quickly,  and  I  think  that  if  the  war  is  not  ended  by 
that  time,  that  many  will  re-enlist  and  that  there  will 
be  little  drafting  in  the  North,  for  the  negroes  are 
coming  in  by  hordes  and  enlisting,  and  in  a  year's  time 
we  will  have  as  many  black  as  white  soldiers. 

Everywhere  at  the  military  posts  here  on  the  rail- 
road, negro  regiments  are  being  formed.  Here  also  is 
a  black  company,  drilling  preparatory  to  joining  a 
colored  regiment  in  Memphis. 

So  far  as  one  can  see  from  the  newspapers  the  negro 
regiments  at  Vicksburg  and  Port  Hudson  are  giving 
good  service.  They  do  not  have  very  much  feeling, 
and  they  take  few  prisoners. 

With  this  I  will  close,  with  the  heartiest  greetings 
from  us  all  to  you  and  your  family,  and  to  all  friends 
and  acquaintances. 

Awaiting  an  early  letter,  I  remain 

Your  Friend, 
Fritz  Wandschneider. 

In  the  winter  of  1862  I  got  under  the  weather.  I 
got  weak,  trembling  spells.  I  went  to  Davenport  to 
see  an  expert  doctor  on  nerves  and  he  said  I  was  going 
into  consumption.  I  went  back  to  Rock  Island.  A 
lot  of  men  were  standing  on  the  street  corner,  looking 
at  something.     I  went  and  looked  too.     While  I  was 

129 

Memoirs.      9. 


MEMOIRS   OF  MARX  D.  HACBERG 

standing  there  I  said  to  one  of  the  men,  "I  was  over 
to  Davenport  to  see  a  doctor  and  he  said  I  was  going 
into  consumption." 

"Whom  did  you  see?"  he  said.     I  told  him. 

"That  fellow  is  no  good,"  he  said.  "He  is  just  look- 
ing for  suckers  like  you.    Did  he  charge  you  $20.00?" 

"Yes,"  I  said. 

"He  ought  to  be  behind  the  bars.  If  you  are  sick  go 
and  see  Dr. (I  forget  his  name)",  he  said. 

When  I  got  there  I  told  him  what  I  came  for.  He 
examined  me  and  said,  "Your  lungs  and  heart  are  all 
right.     Are  you  a  farmer?" 

I  said  "Yes." 

"You  go  on  the  theory  that  what  you  do  yourself 
you  don't  have  to  pay  for — isn't  that  it?  You  are  the 
bully  of  the  country  where  you  live?  are  you  not?" 

"No,  sir,"  I  said,  "We  have  no  bullies  where  I  live; 
we  are  civilized." 

"Young  man,  you  have  too  much  muscle  for  your 
bone ;  I  will  fix  you  up,"  and  he  did,  for  $20.00. 

When  I  got  back  to  Rock  Island  the  train  was  ready 
to  pull  out.  I  took  a  seat  with  an  old  white-headed 
fellow.  I  guess  he  smelled  the  herbs  I  got  in  Daven- 
port. 

"What  have  you  there?"  he  asked. 

"Medicine." 

"May  I  look  at  it?"  He  looked  at  it  and  smelled  of 
it  and  said,  "You  can  take  that ;  it  wont  hurt  you.  Let 
me  feel  of  your  pulse." 

130 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  HAUBERQ 

He  felt  of  my  pulse  and  looked  at  the  white  of  my 
eye,  and  said,  "Do  you  smoke?" 

"No,  I  don't  use  tobacco." 

"Smoking,  perhaps,  will  make  you  nervous,'*  he 
said,  "but  tobacco  is  your  medicine.  Now  I  will  de- 
scribe your  case  to  you  and  see  if  I  am  right."  He  did 
and  he  was  right. 

"Now  I  will  tell  you  my  business,"  he  said.  "I  have 
been  a  medical  director  for  forty  years  in  a  medical 
college  in  Germany.  I  am  getting  old.  I  have  a  son 
who  is  a  doctor  in  St.  Louis,  and  a  son  in  Milwaukee, 
who  is  a  doctor,  and  a  son-in-law  in  Cincinnati  who 
is  a  doctor,  and  I  want  to  see  my  children  before  I  die. 
Now,  young  man,  tobacco  is  your  medicine.  If  you 
want  to  get  well  you  have  to  use  tobacco.  We  recom- 
mend that,  perhaps  in  one  case  of  a  thousand;  and  in 
one  case  of  a  thousand,  perhaps,  if  tobacco  were  taken 
in  the  mouth  it  would  kill  instantly.  What  is  medicine 
for  one  person  may  be  poison  for  another." 

Before  this  I  despised  a  person  who  used  tobacco. 
I  am  a  pig  chewing  tobacco  and  I  know  it — nobody  has 
to  tell  me — but  I  have  not  taken  any  medicine  of  any 
kind  for  fifty-seven  years. 

This  being  the  last  year  we  were  renting  the  farm 
we  were  preparing  to  go  west.  When  father  and 
mother  found  out  what  we  were  up  to,  they  came  to 
see  us.  Father  told  me  what  he  had  heard  and  asked 
me  if  it  was  so,  and  I  told  him  it  was,  and  he  said,  "I 
don't  want  you  to  leave  here ;  I'll  sell  you  the  farm." 

131 


MEMOIRS   OF  MARX  D.   HAUBERG 


EARLY-DAI    I   VNDLE    LANTERNS. 
My   parents  nst  <]  one  of   perforated   sheet-iron.     The   improved   lantern   with   glass 
as  a    wedding-gifl    from   Mr.    and    Mrs.   Henry    Elattenhofi   of    Moline  to   my 
wife  and   mj  self    in    1 362. 

"What  do  you  want  for  the  farm?"  I  asked. 

"One  thousand  dollars."     120  acres  in  section  12. 

Then  mother  said,  "This  land  was  bought  with  the 
money  you  boys  earned  and  you  stay.     Don't  sell  it 
right  out,  father,  but  let  them  pay  us  so  much  a  year 
as  long  as  we  live." 
132 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  IIM  BERG 

We  agreed  to  that,  and  agreed  to  give  them  one  hun- 
dred dollars,  50  bushels  of  corn,  two  tons  of  hay,  20 
bushels  of  wheat  each  year  as  long  as  they  lived;  and 
if  one  died,  one  half  of  the  above. 

That  year  we  thrashed  early  and  sold  our  grain — 
what  we  had  to  spare — and  the  young  stock;  then 
Brother  Dave  and  I  divided  what  we  had.  We  each 
got  three  horses  and  a  colt ;  he  got  four  cows ;  I  got 
three  cows  and  all  the  pigs  and  poultry.  We  divided 
the  grain  and  corn  even  and  we  each  got  $730.00  in 
cash.  Brother  Dave  got  the  farm  in  section  fourteen 
and  moved  his  stuff  to  his  farm. 

I  got  married  the  14th  of  September,  1862,  to  A^na 
Margaret  Frels,  the  little  girl  that  told  her  mother, 
eleven  years  before,  "Our  boy  had  a  fight."  Her 
father,  Henry  Frels,  gave  her  two  cows  for  a  wedding 
present.    My  dear  lady  had  been  living  in  a  nice  brick 


Residence  of  Heflry  Frels; 


it  the  time  of  our  marriage  in  1S62. 

133 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX   />.  HAUBERQ 

house.  When  she  came  with  us  she  moved  into  a  log 
house,  twelve  miles  from  her  former  home,  into  a  bach- 
elor's home.  My  little  sister  Margaret,  nine  years  old, 
stayed  with  us  about  a  year  for  company  to  my  lady. 
My  sister  Margaret,  who  was  afterwards  Mrs.  Fred 
H.  Schroeder,  police  matron  of  Rock  Island. 

My  father-in-law,  Henry  Frels,  was  born  at  Els- 
fleth,  Oldenburg,  Germany,  January  2,  1816,  and  came 
to  this  country  in  the  '30s,  and  lived  for  some  time  in 
Virginia.  He  spent  ten  years  of  his  life  sailing  the 
high  seas  and  on  the  Mississippi  and  Ohio  rivers ; 
worked  a  couple  of  winters  at  the  lead  mines  at  Ga- 
lena, Illinois,  and  in  1842  he  married  and  settled  down 
in  a  log  house  in  the  timber,  in  the  southeast  quarter 
of  section  fourteen,  Hampton  township,  and  started 
clearing  the  land  for  farming.  His  wife  was  Cath- 
erine Mandler,  who  had  come  to  this  county  in  the 
'30s.  She  was  born  at  Launspach,  near  Frankfort-on- 
the-Main,  Germany,  August  6,  1820.  Mr.  Frels  was 
well  known  as  a  farmer ;  he  had  an  interest  in  the 
Cleveland  Mill;  an  interest  in  a  brick  kiln  at  Hamp- 
ton and  at  one  time  owned  the  Farmers'  Store  in  Rock 
Island. 

The  last  of  December  and  first  of  January,  1863-4, 
we  had  one  of  the  worst  cold  spells  that  I  ever  knew. 
We  were  still  living  in  the  log  house.  We  kept  the 
stove  red-hot  and  our  faces  would  be  burning,  and  our 
backs  freezing.  My  cousin,  Eggert  Hauberg,  was 
staying  with  us  that  winter,  cutting  wood  for  his 
134 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  J>.  BAUBERQ 

board,  and  he  could  never  see  any  reason  for  cutting 
stove  wood  ahead.  Our  hog  pen  was  about  six  rods 
from  the  barn.  I  took  them  a  basket  of  corn,  ran  all 
the  way  there  and  back  and  simply  dumped  the  bas- 
ket of  corn  at  them,  and  got  back  to  the  barn  with  one 
ear  badly  frozen.  A  family  by  the  name  of  Fielding 
was  living  several  miles  west  of  us  on  the  Sand 
prairie.  The  old  man  was  visiting  that  day  at  "Col." 
William  Johnson's.  His  folks  at  home  got  their  stove 
so  hot  that  night  it  set  the  house  afire.  They  had  two 
children.  Mrs.  Fielding  carried  the  youngest  and  led 
the  other  by  the  hand.  They  had  to  face  the  wind  to 
the  nearest  neighbor,  a  half  mile  away.  She  froze  the 
arm  that  she  held  the  child  with,  and  the  child  lost  all 
the  fingers  from  both  its  hands,  and  the  older  child 
froze  his  ears  so  they  could  not  be  saved.  The  coldest 
part  of  it  lasted  only  one  day. 

In  the  spring  of  1865  I  bought  forty  acres  of  Dea- 
con W.  C.  Pearsall.  He  wanted  to  send  his  boys,  Lu- 
ther and  Jerry,  to  college  in  Davenport.  I  paid  him 
$590.00  for  the  forty  and  broke  it  the  same  summer. 

In  the  year  1866  I  built  the  stone  house  that  cost  me 
$2500.00.  We  built  it  in  the  oats  field,  about  seventy 
rods  west  of  the  log  house.  We  quarried  the  stone  in 
the  northeast  quarter  of  section  three,  Coe  township. 
John  Hofer  and  George  Bryant,  both  of  Cordova,  did 
the  mason  work,  and  John  Spaeth  and  Henry  Oppen- 
dike  did  the  carpenter  work.  Spaeth  had  the  contract 
to  do  the  carpenter  work  for  $225.00.    All  the  flooring 

135 


MEMOIRS   OF  MARX  D.  HAUBERG 

had  to  be  planed  and  tongued  and  grooved  by  hand. 
They  did  their  work  well  and  the  house  is  as  good  to- 
day as  the  day  they  finished  it.  I  dug  the  well  seventy 
feet  in  dirt  and  worked  down  ten  feet  further  in  the 
rock.  Phil.  Wilson,  a  brother  of  our  neighbor,  Tom 
Wilson,  walled  up  the  well  with  stone  and  did  a  fine 
job  of  it.  Afterward  we  had  the  well  drilled  32  feet 
deeper. 

The  same  summer  that  we  were  building  our  house, 
Chris.  Hofer  and  Phil.  Wilson  were  putting  up  Amos 
Golden's  stone  house. 

I  tore  down  the  barn  that  I  had  built  in  1863  and 
rebuilt  it  on  the  new  place.  When  that  was  done  we 
had  a  dance  in  it.  We  had  four  musicians  from  Rock 
Island.  They  were  old  man  Bleuer,  Joseph  Stroehle, 
F.  Eckhardt  and  a  Mr.  Mathis.  We  had  a  big  time. 
Everybody  in  the  country  was  there.  A  bunch  of 
young  men  had  just  arrived  from  Germany  that 
spring  and  were  working  on  farms  around.  They 
came  to  the  dance  also.  Among  them  were  William 
Ernst,  who  married  Louisa  Hahn,  daughter  of  our 
neighbor,  and  Lothar  Harms,  now  proprietor  of  Hotel 
Harms  in  Rock  Island. 

In  1863  my  wife's  cousin,  John  Wiegant,  fourteen 
years  old,  came  to  stay  with  us.  He  stayed  with  us 
six  years. 

In  1864  Brother  Dave  and  I  bought  a  threshing  ma- 
chine. We  thrashed  until  late  in  the  winter  those 
days.     We  pulled  in  about  the  middle  of  January  one 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  HAUBERG 


The    stun.,    resilience   built    in    1806.      It   is   still    our   home. 


year.  We  could  have  kept  on  threshing  all  winter, 
there  was  so  much  to  do.  The  next  winter  we  worked 
to  get  through  by  Christmas.  We  sometimes  had  to 
shovel  snow  to  get  through  with  the  outfit.  The  first 
season  we  used  an  eight-horse-power,  and  after  that 
we  had  a  ten-horse-power.  We  thrashed  eight  sea- 
sons. We  got  three  cents  for  oats,  four  cents  for  bar- 
ley and  six  cents  for  wheat  and  rye. 

In  the  winter  of  1867  my  wife  and  I  went  to  town, 
leaving  John  Wiegant  and  the  two  little  girls  at  home. 
They  were  aged  two  and  four  years.  When  we  came 
back  there  was  great  excitement.  They  met  us  at  the 
gate,  and  said:  "Two  big  Indians  were  here  and  they 

137 


MEMOIRS   OF  MANX  D.  HAUBERO 

took  Ma's  flower  wreath,  and  her  turkey  tail  along. 
They  asked  John  if  they  could  have  it  and  he  didn't 
say  "no"  quick  enough.  They  had  it  before  he  said 
"no." 

"Well,"  we  asked,  "wasn't  you  afraid  they  would 
take  Ma's  little  girls  along?" 

"No,  we  wasn't  afraid.  We  got  under  the  table  so 
they  couldn't  get  us." 

The  Indians  took  with  them  a  large  wreath  my  wife 
had  made  of  bitter-sweet ;  a  turkey  gobbler's  tail,  a 
shiny  mallard  duck  head,  and  some  small  pieces  of 
bacon. 

In  the  fall  of  1868  we  had  a  "Harvest  Home"  picnic, 
in  Marshall's  grove,  where  William  Feaster  now  lives, 
(in  the  southeast  quarter  of  the  northwest  quarter  of 
section  seventeen,  Canoe  Creek  township).  Some  of 
the  picnicers  brought  a  big  pumpkin,  a  big  squash,  a 
big  potato,  a  big  apple  or  a  big  colt,  etc.,  to  show  what 
they  had.  We  all  agreed  that  if  they  would  do  that 
next  year  we  would  give  the  fellow  who  had  the  big- 
gest pumpkin  a  quarter,  and  a  quarter  to  every  fellow 
that  had  the  biggest  article  of  its  kind.  We  all  chipped 
in  a  nickel. 

The  next  harvest-home  picnic,  in  1869,  was  a  suc- 
cess. Everybody  had  something  to  show.  Even  the 
women  got  interested.  They  showed  their  quilts  and 
other  fancy  needlework  and  knitting.  Before  we  went 
home  that  evening  we  agreed  to  have  a  fair  the  next 
year  and  set  the  time  for  a  meeting  to  elect  officers  to 

13S 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  HAVBERQ 


manage  it.  N.  B.  Joslin  was  elected  president;  vice- 
president.  Jergem  D.  Hauberg;  treasurer,  Jasper 
Sells;  secretary,  N.  J.  Blackman;  general  superin- 
tendent, M.  D.  Hauberg;  marshals,  John  A.  Liphardt 
and  J.  T.  Walker;  directors,  D.  W.  Talcott,  James 
Camp,  Henry  Oppendike,  C.  Dillon,  John  F.  Hahn, 
John  A.  Johnson,  Herman  Liphardt.     They  elected  N. 


OFFICERS'   RACE,   ROCK    ISLAND   COUNTY    AGRICULTURAL   BOARD; 
commonly  known   a<   "The  Hillsdale  Fair." 

From  left  to  right,  the  contestants  are:  M.  1).  Hauberg,  David  M.  Mai  tin. 
John  A.  Liphardt.  John  Hahn  and  "Big"  John  Johnson.  This  picture  taken 
about  1885.  Fair  Grounds  were  in  X.  E.  &  of  the  S.  W.  »4.  Section  18, 
( lanoe  ( Ireek  Township. 

B.  Joslin,  N.  J.  Blackman  and  M.  D.  Hauberg  a  com- 
mittee to  look  up  a  place  to  hold  the  fair.  We  decided 
that  Martin's  Grove  would  be  the  place.  We  called  on 
Joseph  Martin  and  leased  the  ground  for  five  years, 
at  five  dollars  a  year. 

The  first  meeting  to  organize  was  held  the  first  Sat- 
urday in  January,  1870.    We  named  it  the  Rock  Island 

139 


MEMOIRS   OF  MARX  D.  II M  BERG 

County  Agricultural  Board  of  Coe  and  Canoe  Creek. 
We  elected  committees  to  prepare  the  ground  and  for 
other  purposes. — Finance,  N.  J.  Blackman,  M.  D.  Hau- 
berg  and  D.  M.  Martin ;  general  improvements,  John 
Johnson,  Henry  Oppendike;  track,  D.  M.  Martin,  J. 
D.  Hauberg  and  D.  Talcott;  auditing,  Tom  Walker,  J. 
D.  Hauberg  and  James  Camp ;  stabling  and  sheds,  J. 
D.  Hauberg,  Tom  Walker  and  C.  Dillon;  entertain- 
ment, M.  D.  Hauberg,  John  Liphardt  and  D.  M.  Mar- 
tin ;  music  and  printing,  M.  D.  Hauberg  and  Jasper 
Sell. 

The  first  two  years  we  had  no  premium  list,  nor 
rules  to  guide  the  Fair.  The  third  annual  meeting 
they  elected  M.  D.  Hauberg  to  write  the  preamble  and 
by-laws  and  rules  and  regulations  to  govern  the  Fair. 
I  asked  them  what  kind  of  pre-amble  and  by-laws,  and 
regulations  they  wanted,  what  premiums  they  wanted 
on  different  articles.  We  were  all  green  backwoods- 
men, with  very  little  schooling,  with  two  exceptions — 
those  two  were  learned  men — but  when  it  came  to  this 
kind  of  business,  they  knew  no  more  than  the  rest  of 
us.  They  said  to  me,  "You  write  the  book  and  we  will 
see  it  when  it  is  done." 

I  wrote  the  book.  When  it  was  finished  I  told  the 
president  to  call  a  meeting  of  the  officers.  At  the 
meeting  I  started  to  read  the  book.  When  I  was  about 
half  through  the  president  said,  "Hold  on,  that  takes 
too  long  to  read  it  all."  Then  one  of  our  learned  men 
got  up   and  moved  that  the  whole  of  the   report  be 

14(1 


MEMOIRS   OF  MARX  I).   HAT'BERG 

adopted  without  further  reading,  and  it  carried.  Then 
I  suggested  we  have  a  committee  to  solicit  advertise- 
ments from  manufacturers  and  business  men.  Some 
one  moved  that  M.  D.  Hauberg  be  the  committee,  and 
it  carried.     The  book  I  wrote  is  the  same  book  they 


The   Stokes'    flour-mill   at   Cleveland,    111.      Capacity    100    bbls.    per   flay. 

are  now  using  at  the  Joslin   Fair,  except  they  have 
raised  the  premiums. 

As  we  had  no  agricultural  society  organized  under 
the  state  law,  the  supervisors  of  the  county  elected  a 
delegate  to  the  state  board  of  agriculture  meetings  to 
elect  a  director  from  each  congressional  district  in  the 
state.     They  elected  me ;  which  created  quite  a  bit  of 

141 


MEMOIRS   OF  MARX  D.  HAVBERG 

hard  feeling  towards  the  supervisors  and  me,  from  the 
manufacturers. 

There  was  no  permanent  place  to  hold  the  state  fair 
and  it  was  held  in  different  parts  of  the  state.  They 
had  difficulty  in  finding  room  for  the  exhibits.  Cook 
county  (Chicago),  being  mostly  represented  by  law- 
yers, bulldozed  the  rural  districts  to  build  barns  and 
sheds  for  their  exhibitors,  and  the  manufacturers  over 
the  rest  of  the  state  had  to  build  their  own  shelters 
for  their  exhibits. 

The  manufacturers  of  Rock  Island  county  did  not 
want  a  farmer.  They  wanted  a  smart  man  from  the 
city  to  represent  them  and  fight  the  Chicago  fellows. 
We  went  to  Springfield,  where  the  Fair  was  that  year, 
on  the  same  train,  but  they  did  not  speak  to  me.  When 
we  came  home  on  the  same  train,  they  patted  me  on 
the  back  and  said,  ''Bully  for  you ;  you  have  settled  for 
all  time  what  we  have  been  fighting  for,  for  twenty 
years." 

There  were  two  things  that  I  helped  to  do.  First, 
was  my  notion  that  each  congressional  district  should 
elect  its  own  representative  on  the  board  of  directors 
of  the  state  fair,  instead  of  having  all  the  representa- 
tives of  the  whole  state  vote  on  every  board  member. 
The  motion  carried.  This  change  was  caused  by  the 
Chicago  fellows  opposing  our  man,  Sam  Dysart,  of 
Lee  county.  Dysart  was  a  good  man,  and  afterwards 
was  appointed  the  United  States  representative  at  the 
Paris  exposition,  to  look  after  all  livestock,  and  per- 

142 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  HAUBERG 

haps  other  exhibits,  at  the  exposition  from  this  coun- 
try. 

Next  came  what  our  local  manufacturers  wanted. 
The  Chicago  fellows  got  up  as  usual  and  moved  that 
as  Cook  county  paid  such  large  share  of  the  state  taxes, 
that  the  fair  board  should  erect  buildings  for  the  free 
use  of  the  manufacturers  of  Cook  county.  The  Cook 
county  men  were  mostly  lawyers  and  preachers,  and 
while  they  talked  in  favor  of  their  motion  I  wrote  a 
substitute  motion  and  offered  it,  and  after  a  good  deal 
of  talking,  it  was  carried.  That  motion  put  all  the 
exhibitors,  the  state  over,  on  an  equal  footing  so  far  as 
putting  up  buildings  for  them  was  concerned.  I  think 
this  was  the  year  1894. 

While  I  was  at  the  fair  I  was  appointed  a  judge  on 
poultry.  The  superintendent  being  on  a  drunk,  there 
was  nothing  doing  that  day.  The  next  morning,  when 
we  reported  for  duty  to  the  secretary — there  were 
three  of  us — he  said,  "Nothing  to-day,  the  fellow  isn't 
sobered  up  yet." 

I  said,  "We  can't  stay  here  all  week,  waiting  for 
him  to  get  sober;  get  somebody  else  to  do  the  busi- 
ness; anybody  can  do  that." 

"Can  you  do  it?" 

"Yes,  sir,  I  can  do  it." 

He  handed  me  the  book — we  got  a  judge  in  my  place 
— and  we  went  to  it.  When  we  were  through  I  handed 
the  book  back  to  the  secretary.  He  looked  it  over  and 
said,  "All  right." 

143 


MEMOIRS   OF  MARX  D.  HAUBERG 

I  have  been  a  judge  at  the  state  fair  on  sheep  in 
1881,  and  on  hogs,  Shorthorn  cattle,  running  horses, 
vegetables  and  fruit.  Fruit  is  the  most  particular  job 
of  any.  A  person  should  know  the  nature  of  the  dif- 
ferent kinds  of  apples. 

In  1877  the  fair  association  was  going  to  have  a 
Fourth  of  July  celebration.  We  advertised  pretty  big. 
I  was  the  committee  on  music  for  the  fair.  They  in- 
structed me  to  hire  a  band — ten  pieces.  I  told  them 
they  had  better  limit  me  to  the  amount  I  should  pay. 
I  said,  "Fourth  of  July  is  the  banclman's  harvest." 
They  said,  "Go  ahead  and  hire."  I  hired  a  band  for 
$101.00.  The  stands  were  sold  the  same  day,  for 
$25.00. 

When  I  got  off  the  train  at  Hillsdale  somebody  told 
me  what  the  stands  had  sold  for  and  who  bought  them. 
John  Liphardt  got  a  stand,  including  the  dance  floor, 
for  $15.00.  I  made  up  my  mind  he  should  turn  over 
the  dance  floor  to  the  society,  if  we  wanted  it.  Before 
going  home  I  reported  to  the  president  and  told  him 
to  call  a  meeting  at  the  fair  grounds  at  six  o'clock  to- 
morrow morning.  Next  day  was  the  Fourth  of  July. 
Every  officer  was  on  hand  at  six  o'clock.  I  told  them 
what  I  had  done  and  stated  the  object  of  the  meeting. 
I  told  them  that  if  Mr.  Liphardt  would  turn  his  stand 
over  to  the  society  we  could  run  it  ourselves  and  per- 
haps make  enough  to  pay  for  the  music.  Mr.  Lip- 
hardt agreed  to  do  this.  Then  they  sent  me  to  buy 
what  was  needed  for  the  stand.     I  told  them  to  send 

144 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  II M  BERG 

OFFH  ERS   OF  THE   "COE   FAIR,"   A    RIVAL  OF   THE   "HILLSDALE   FAIH." 


Though  the  respective  grounds  were  only  six  mile-  apart,  they  sometimes 
held  their  Fairs  on  the  same  'Kites.  Front  row:  Hugh  McCall  and  Ah.  Hollister. 
Next  row:  George  W.  LaRue,  Luther  S.  Pearsall,  William  Ziegler  and  Thomas 
McCall.  Next  row:  Dr.  Wilson  Fleming,  M.D.,  George  Genung,  Henry  Sad- 
doris  and  Mark  Ashdown.  Rear  row:  Jere  Pearsall,  William  Ashdown,  Arista 
Saddoris,  Jesse  Dailey  and  William  McRoberts.  Taken  about  1885.  Grounds 
wire  north   of   public  road,   in   S.    W.    %    of   N.    E.    '-  +  .   Sec.   20,   Coe  Hwp. 

someone  to  meet  me  at  the  station  with  a  wagon  in  the 
evening.  It  was  two  and  a  half  miles  to  the  station 
and  the  train  would  leave  at  7:30.  The  other  fellows 
got  things  ready  for  the  picnic. 

I  went  to  Rock  Island  and  got  what  I  could  there. 
I  did  not  get  much.  Then  I  went  to  Davenport.  None 
of  us  had  any  experience.  I  got  into  one  of  those 
stores  where  they  sell  things  for  use  of  stands  and 
take  back  what  was  not  sold,  and  they  made  all  kinds 
of  suggestions  for  me.  I  would  say,  "We  can  not  sell 
it  all,"  and  they  would  say,  "We  will  take  it  back  if 
you  do  not  sell  it." 

14.1 


.1/.  moirs.     10. 


MEMOIRS   OF  MARX  D.  HAL-BERG 

The  brass  band  came  up  in  great  style.  The  next 
morning  Aleck  Ashdown  was  put  in  as  cashier  at  the 
stand.  Brother  Dave,  and  Dave  Martin  and  some  of 
the  others  worked  in  the  stand.  John  Liphardt  ran 
the  dancing  floor.  Herman  Liphardt  made  some 
grape  wine  the  year  before  and  he  brought  two  gal- 
lons to  the  picnic  with  him  and  we  colored  our  lemon- 
ade and  ice  cream  with  it.  Big  John  Johnson  was 
superintendent  of  the  ice  cream.  The  stuff  I  bought 
cost  $48.00  or  $50.00  and  we  sold  $150.00-some  dol- 
lars, and  had  sugar  and  crackers  left.  Our  total  ex- 
pense was  $186.00,  and  total  income  $179.00.  We  each 
chipped  in  a  quarter  and  paid  our  debts. 

We  had  a  fine  day,  a  big  crowd  and  a  great  time. 
Heretofore  everybody  thought  I  was  an  honest  man, 
but  I  lost  that  reputation  at  that  picnic.  About  a 
dozen  fine-haired  chaps  from  Rock  Island,  wearing 
plug  hats,  were  buying  cigars.  The  fellow  behind  the 
bar  handed  down  a  box.  They  took  out  some,  smelled 
of  them  and  said,  "How  much  apiece?" 

"Five  cents,"  the  fellow  said. 

The  chap  said,  "Haven't  you  any  better?" 

The  fellow  said,  "No." 

I  said,  "Yes,  we  have,  but  maybe  they  are  a  little  too 
high  priced  for  you."  I  went  around  the  bar  and 
handed  down  a  box  and  said,  "These  are  fifteen  cents." 
They  took  out  some,  smelled  of  them  and  said,  "Could 
you  let  us  have  two  for  a  quarter?"  I  said,  "Well,  as 
long  as  there  are  several  of  you,  I  guess  we  can."  They 

14G 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  HAVBERO 

were  five-cent  cigars,  the  same  as  the  others.  They 
cost  $1.50  a  box.  The  first  cigar  was  all  right,  I  could 
see,  but  they  did  not  want  us  to  know  they  smoked 
cheap  cigars. 

In  those  days  everybody  drove  their  stock  cattle  to 
the  Docia  in  the  spring,  and  let  them  pasture  there  all 
summer.  The  Docia  was  a  free-for-all  at  that  time. 
We  would  brand  our  cattle  before  taking  them  there. 
We  had  our  ear-mark,  ours  was  a  slit  in  each  ear,  but 
anyone  could  change  that  kind  of  a  mark  or  cut  the  ear 
off  altogether.  So  we  branded  them.  I  would  go  down 
every  week  or  every  two  weeks  with  salt  and  see  how 
our  cattle  were  getting  along.  They  did  not  stray 
much.  One  year  a  heifer  got  away,  but  I  found  her 
next  year  at  Dan  Schryver's,  near  Erie.  One  year  we 
lost  a  fine  steer.  I  found  him  on  the  bluff  north  of 
Docia  with  Mr.  Lutz's  herd.  He  had  bought  150  head 
in  Wisconsin.  I  told  him  he  had  one  of  my  steers, 
and  when  I  pointed  mine  out,  he  showed  me  the  paper 
proving  he  had  bought  him  in  Wisconsin.  I  said, 
"Mine  has  a  brand  on  him,  but  it  is  not  branded  deep 
and  we  will  have  to  catch  him  and  put  water  on  the 
brand  to  see  it."  It  was  a  roan  steer,  now  three  years 
old,  and  wild,  with  head  up.  I  said,  "If  I  can't  catch 
him,  he  isn't  mine."  He  had  always  been  tame  to  me. 
We  had  brought  him  up  by  hand.  I  took  salt  and 
called  him  by  name.  He  had  his  head  up,  but  after  a 
while  came  and  licked  the  salt.  I  caught  him  by  the 
horns  and  threw  him  and  sat  on  his  head  to  hold  him 

147 


MEMOIRS   OF  MARX  D.   HAUBERG 

down  while  Mr.  Lutz  poured  water  on  the  brand.     He 
said,  "He's  your  steer." 

In  the  summer  of  1869  and  in  1870  we  began  to  lose 
cattle  and  horses.     In  1870  I  lost  three  two-year-old 


(>hr  branding   iron.      We  used    it    as   late  as  the   '70's. 

steers,  and  one  two-year-old  colt.  In  the  fall  of  1870 
we  had  a  meeting  at  Bluff  school  and  organized  a  Coe 
Protective  Association.  It  was  an  anti-horse  and  cat- 
tle thief  society.  As  president  we  elected  either  Daniel 
Nicewanger,  who  was  living  on  what  afterwards  was 

148 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  I).  11M  BERG 

the  William  Mill  Stock  Farm,  or  it  was  Charles  B. 
Marshall,  who  owned  what  is  now  the  Dedrick  H. 
Bracker  farm.  We  had  a  Council  of  Twelve  men,  and 
ten  "Minute  men."  Each  of  the  Minute  men  had  an 
assistant,  making  twenty  men  who  were  bound  to  be 
off  at  a  minute's  notice,  in  case  they  were  called  on. 

We  had  correspondence  with  other  societies,  like 
ours,  and  all  these  societies  would  help  each  other  if 
possible.  We  would  get  notice,  through  letters,  tele- 
grams or  newspapers. 

One  day  Fred  Owens  of  Cordova  was  in  the  woods 
back  of  Wm.  Mill's,  in  the  neighborhood  of  the  stone 
quarry  at  the  Middle  Crossing.  He  was  gathering 
nuts,  and  came  on  to  two  horses  tied  back  in  a  hollow, 
out  of  sight  of  the  public  road.  The  horses  were  cov- 
ered with  sweat  as  if  they  had  done  hard  traveling.  It 
looked  so  suspicious  that  he  hurried  to  Nicewanger's 
and  reported  it.  Nicewanger  sent  out  one  of  his  men 
to  notify  the  Minute  man  and  he  himself  rode  to  the 
Docia  so  as  to  get  on  the  Middle  Crossing  road  before 
the  thieves  got  there.  When  he  got  to  the  edge  of  the 
bluff  he  saw  the  two  horses  with  two  men  crossing 
toward  Philleos  Island,  to  the  east  of  the  public  road. 
He  rode  as  fast  as  he  could  to  the  north.  In  the  mean- 
time C.  B.  Marshall,  Dave  Martin,  and  others  of  the 
Minute-men  were  hurrying,  horseback,  with  rifles  and 
shotguns,  coming  down  the  bluff  to  the  Docia.  The 
Docia  was  so  much  swamp  that  if  you  got  off  the  regu- 
lar Middle  Crossing  road  you  would  get  lost  in  them 

140 


MEMOIRS   OF  MARX    D.   II  U  BERQ 

unless  you  were  acquainted.  The  horse  thieves  were 
strangers  and  they  soon  got  them.  The  horse  of  one 
of  them  got  mired  and  he  surrendered.  The  other  got 
off  his  horse  and  started  in  the  direction  of  a  cornfield 
on  the  north  side  of  the  Docia,  but  the  Minute-men 
got  within  range  of  him  and  commenced  shooting,  and 
he  surrendered. 

The  men  were  taken  to  Cordova.  Telegrams  were 
sent  over  the  country,  one  was  sent  to  some  place  in 
Wisconsin,  and  a  telegram  came  right  back,  "Hold  the 
thieves.  Will  come  on  the  first  train."  The  owner 
came  with  an  officer  and  the  thieves  were  glad  to  get 
out  of  the  hands  of  our  Minute-men,  and  go  to  Wiscon- 
sin without  waiting  for  requisition  papers.  The  horses 
were  taken  back  also.  They  had  been  stolen  from  a 
farmer.  One  of  the  thieves  was  his  hired  man.  The 
other  was  a  member  of  a  threshing  crew  who  was 
threshing  at  his  place.  They  had  always  slept  in  the 
house  but  that  night  they  stayed  in  the  barn.  Next 
morning  they  and  the  two  horses  were  gone. 

George  LaRue  was  living  one  mile  west  of  Bluff 
School.  He  was  one  of  our  Minute-men  and  had  a 
horse  stolen.  He  called  out  his  assistant  and  they 
traced  the  horse  to  Jackson  county,  Iowa.  The  west- 
ern part  of  the  county  was  timber  and  a  horse  thief 
organization  was  said  to  have  its  headquarters  there. 
George  and  his  assistant  were  gone  two  weeks  but 
came  back  without  the  horse. 

John  Quick  owned  the  forty  acres  that  we  now  own 
ino 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  HAVBERG 


An  bid  landmark  at  the  Middle  Crossing  overlooking  the  'Docia,  in  Section 
Five,  Canoe  Creek  Township.  It  was  blasted  down  and  used  to  macadamize 
the   road   to  Erie.      Phi]leo*s   Island   is  seen   in   the   distance. 


at  the  Middle  Crossing.  He  had  a  rail  fence  around  it 
and  kept  his  cattle  there.  One  of  his  fine  steers  was 
missing  and  he  notified  all  the  Minutemen,  I  being  one 
of  them.  "Big  John"  Johnson  was  my  assistant.  A 
few  days  later  I  went  to  Clinton,  la.,  and  took  dinner 
with  my  wife's  uncle,  Henry  Gode.  They  had  some 
very  fine,  fresh  beef.  I  asked  where  they  got  it,  and 
they  said  they  had  bought  a  quarter  beef  weighing 
190  pounds,  of  George  Mitchel,  "who  has  got  some  rel- 
atives over  by  the  Docia."  I  said  nothing,  and  before 
I  left  Clinton  I  found  out  where  the  hide  of  that  beef 

151 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  HAUBERO 

was,  without  anybody  suspecting  anything.  John 
Quick's  mark  was  an  ear  mark  and  a  dewlap.  I  gave 
notice,  and  John  Quick  and  our  president  went  to  Clin- 
ton and  identified  the  hide. 

Mark  Ashdown  was  justice  of  the  peace  and  we  pre- 
pared a  warrant  for  George  Mitchel.  I  had  been 
elected  constable  but  refused  to  qualify,  and  we  ar- 
ranged with  a  constable  in  Whiteside  county  to  arrest 
the  man  when  he  came  to  his  field  on  this  side  of  the 
Mississippi,  but  after  a  while  he  sent  word  he  would 
not  serve  in  the  case,  and  I  was  elected  to  go  after  him. 
I  arranged  to  have  some  one  notify  me  when  the  man 
would  be  on  this  side  of  the  river  and  when  I  got  word 
from  him,  I  got  on  a  horse  and  ran  him  nearly  all  the 
way  there.  I  was  just  in  time.  I  found  my  man  wait- 
ing for  the  ferry.  I  arrested  him,  and  he  very  po- 
litely said  he  would  go  with  me,  but  wanted  to  put  up 
his  team  and  change  clothes — in  Clinton.  I  knew  I  had 
no  jurisdiction  over  there  and  he  would  be  free,  so  he 
had  to  make  other  arrangements  about  his  horses  and 
clothes. 

I  brought  him  to  our  own  home  and  kept  him  over 
night,  and  took  him  to  Port  Byron  the  next  day  where 
he  had  a  hearing  before  John  Mulholland,  a  justice  of 
the  peace.  The  prisoner  had  arranged  to  have  a  Clin- 
ton lawyer  come  down  on  the  train.  We  met  the  train 
and  he  pretended  not  to  have  seen  his  lawyer  and  po- 
litely asked  me  to  let  him  go  on  down  to  Rock  Island 
and  get  a  lawyer,  but  I  declined  and  a  little  later  we 

152 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  II M  BERG 

found  that  his  lawyer  had  come  on  the  train.     He  was 
bound  over  to  the  grand  jury. 

George  McNeal  was  constable  in  Port  Byron  and  he 
took  the  prisoner  all  over  the  country  looking  for 
some  one  to  sign  his  bond  to  keep  him  out  of  jail.  He 
finally  got  an  Irishman  living  on  the  north  side  of  the 
Docia  in  Whiteside  county  and  who  had  a  reputation 
of  being  a  thief  also,  to  sign  with  him.  The  grand 
jury  found  a  true  bill,  but  in  the  end  he  was  acquitted. 

In  1868  I  bought  Garrett  Quick's  farm  of  120  acres, 
for  $3200.  In  1869  I  built  a  good-sized  cow  barn.  In 
1880  I  bought  a  quarter  section  of  land  near  Sioux 
City,  la.,  for  $800.00. 

In  the  winters  of  1868,  '69  and  '70  I  sold  farm  im- 
plements —  fanning  mills,  stalk  cutters,  grain  seeders, 
etc.  I  would  put  a  fanning  mill  and  a  stalk  cutter  on 
the  wagon,  and  tie  a  seeder  to  the  back  of  the  wagon, 
and  start  out.  My  territory  was  Rock  Island,  Henry 
and  Whiteside  counties.  The  fanning  mill  was  made 
in  Moline,  the  stalk  cutter  in  Rock  Island,  and  the 
seeder  in  Ohio.  I  sold  on  commission.  The  stalk  cut- 
ter and  seeder  was  something  new  to  the  community, 
and  the  country  was  full  of  just  such  peddlers  as  I. 
We  took  orders  and  shipped  the  machines  in  the  spring. 
I  sold  the  best  on  the  market,  at  least,  I  told  them  so. 
I  was  pretty  successful.  I  would  make  enough  in  two 
months  to  pay  my  hired  help  for  the  whole  year.  In 
March  we  would  go  and  set  up  what  we  had  sold  and 

1.-,:: 


MEMOIRS  OF  MANX  I).  HAUBERG 

settle  for  it.  Most  of  the  time  we  had  to  take  a  note 
for  eight  months  with  ten  per  cent  interest. 

James  LaRue's  farm  joined  ours  at  the  west.  One 
day  in  1874  he  came  over  and  borrowed  our  Buckeye 
combination  reaper  and  mower.  He  was  going  to  cut 
grass  in  the  meadow  south  of  his  house,  down  in  the 
hollow.  He  had  a  skittish  team  and  when  they  came 
to  a  little  washout  in  the  hollow  they  jumped  across 
and  threw  Jim  into  the  sickle,  or  knives.  It  cut  his 
arm  badly.  They  sent  for  Dr.  J.  W.  Morgan  and  Dr. 
Hoke.  Dr.  Hoke  got  there  first  and  amputated  the 
arm  the  same  afternoon.  LaRue  died  inside  of  an 
hour. 

In  this  connection  I  want  to  mention  the  case  of 
Samuel  Bruner.  He  was  running  the  old-fashioned 
kind  of  threshing  machine,  called  a  "Beater,"  and  got 
his  hand  into  the  cylinder.  It  tore  his  hand  to  shreds. 
They  sent  for  Dr.  E.  E.  Rogers  of  Port  Byron.  He 
decided  the  hand  had  to  come  off,  and  used  a  common 
hand-saw  to  amputate  it. 

In  1872  I  joined  the  Grangers.  We  had  our  meet- 
ings at  Bluff  School  house.  Jerry  Pearsall  and  I  were 
the  purchasing  committee  for  our  society,  and  I  think 
we  were  about  the  first  ones  to  send  orders  to  Mont- 
gomery Ward's  in  Chicago,  the  mail  order  house.  I 
was  also  made  the  shipping  committee  and  shipped 
their  hogs  and  cattle,  and  also  bought  the  farm  imple- 
ments that  were  wanted. 

In   1875   they  organized   a   County   Grange.     Each 

154 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  11 M  BERG 

local  would  send  delegates  to  the  County  Grange.  In 
1876  the  county  organization  voted  to  have  a  County 
Co-operative  Grange  store,  with  a  capital  stock  of 
$7500.00,  to  be  located  at  Rock  Island.  LeQuat  of 
Drury  township,  Lewis  Wilson  of  Rural,  A.  C.  Stevens 
of  South  Moline,  L.  D.,  Edwards  of  Hampton,  and  my- 
self, representing  the  townships  of  Cordova,  Canoe 
Creek  and  Coe,  were  elected  as  a  committee  to  apply 
to  the  secretary  of  state  for  a  commission  to  solicit 
subscriptions. 

When  we  had  enough  subscribed  we  called  a  meet- 
ing of  the  stockholders.  At  that  meeting  they  voted  to 
have  seven  directors,  and  the  following  were  elected: 
Lewis  Wilson  of  Rural,  Charles  Kyte  of  Black  Hawk, 
Major  Glenn  of  Coal  Valley,  Ship  Silvis  and  L.  D.  Ed- 
wards of  Hampton  township  and  myself  of  Coe  town- 
ship. 

We  directors  organized  by  electing  Wilson  presi- 
dent, and  Kyte  clerk.  The  first  thing  in  order  was  on 
what  per  cent  shall  we  sell.  I  moved  that  we  sell  at 
25  per  cent  above  first  cost.  Silvis  moved  as  an 
amendment  that  we  sell  at  ten  per  cent  above  first  cost. 
WTe  argued  all  day  without  a  decision.  The  next  morn- 
ing we  went  at  it  again.  Before  we  went  to  dinner 
we  took  a  vote  and  the  amendment  carried  five  to  two. 
Kyte  and  I  opposed  it.  The  next  thing  in  order  was 
to  rent  a  store  room.  Thomas  Schindler,  the  butcher, 
had  a  store  on  Second  avenue  for  $700.00  rent  a  year. 
Tegeler  had  a  store  on  Third  avenue  we  could  have  for 

155 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  H  \l  BERQ 

a  thousand  dollars  a  year.  The  vote  on  the  store  build- 
ing stood  the  same  as  the  other,  five  to  two  in  favor  of 
the  Tegeler  store.  Next  was  to  elect  a  manager.  I 
had  seen  a  man  at  Albany,  111.,  an  experienced  man  in 
the  store  business,  but  he  was  not  a  Granger.  He 
wanted  $700.00  a  year.  I  proposed  him  as  manager, 
but  the  directors  decided  they  wanted  a  man  of  their 
own  kind,  a  granger.  They  hired  A.  C.  Stevens,  as 
manger,  for  ten  hundred  dollars  a  year,  and  he  to  hire 
his  own  book-keeper  and  clerk.  The  book-keeper  to 
get  from  $600.00  to  $1,000.00  a  year.  He  hired  Frank 
Harris  at  $1,000.00  a  year,  both  of  them  farmers, 
without  experience  in  the  store  business.  Then  we 
adjourned  for  the  day.  Kyte  and  I  figured  that  even- 
ing that  our  expenses  would  be  $5,000.00  a  year,  and 
we  would  have  to  sell  $50,000.00  worth  a  year  to  make 
expenses,  to  say  nothing  about  shrinkage,  freight,  bad 
accounts,  perishable  goods,  and  dead  stock,  and  we 
went  into  the  meeting  next  morning  to  get  a  raise  on 
the  selling  price.  I  did  most  of  the  talking.  Charles 
Kyte  was  a  quiet  fellow  but  voted  right.  We  worked 
hard  to  sell  at  25  per  cent,  but  finally  settled  on  fifteen 
per  cent  above  cost,  which  was  just  as  good  as  bank- 
ruptcy to  start  with. 

About  $6,000.00  worth  of  stock  was  paid  up.  The 
balance  we  could  not  collect. 

Three  months  after  we  opened  the  store  the  direc- 
tors had  a  meeting.  I  moved  the  president  appoint  a 
committee  to  take  an  invoice  of  the  store.  He  ap- 
15<; 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  I).  JIM  BERO 

pointed  Silvis  and  Kyte.  When  they  reported  they 
said  we  had  made  $2,200.00.  I  told  the  committee  they 
did  not  know  their  business.  Silvis  said,  "Mr.  Presi- 
dent, appoint  Mr.  Hauberg,  if  he  knows  it  all."  T  said 
I  would  accept,  if  I  was  appointed.  When  I  got 
through  I  reported  a  loss  of  three  thousand  dollars  by 
the  time  we  would  dispose  of  the  trash  we  had  on 
hand.  We  had  a  good  supply  of  butter  on  hand,  which 
had  been  taken  from  the  farmers  at  20  cents  a  pound, 
which  the  store  afterwards  sold  to  the  Warnock  & 
Ralston  soap  factory  at  four  cents  a  pound,  and  other 
items  of  a  similar  nature.  I  am  writing  this  to  vindi- 
cate the  managers  of  the  store.    They  were  good,  hon- 


The  Lime  Kiln  on  Main   St.,  Port   Byron.     Picture  was  taken  in  1914. 


157 


.MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  HAUBERG 

est  men,  and  good  farmers,  but  they  did  not  know  how 
to  make  a  store  pay. 

We  next  put  in  L.  D.  Edwards  to  run  the  store,  and 
he  did  well,  but  it  could  not  be  made  a  success.  Our 
competitors  would  advertise  one  item  of  groceries 
cheaper  than  we  did,  and  our  own  Grangers  would  go 
there  to  trade.  The  third  year  we  found  things  hope- 
less and  voted  to  sell  out  to  the  highest  bidder.  My 
father-in-law,  Henry  Frels,  bid  35  cents  on  the  dollar. 
I  objected  to  it  going  so  cheap.  Madison  Bowles  called 
out,  "Let  him  have  it,"  so  we  got  $700.00.  We  had  to 
make  a  fifteen  per  cent  assessment  on  the  stockholders 
to  pay  debts,  and  I  had  to  collect  from  all  the  Upper 
End  folks,  and  had  to  threaten  suit  to  get  some  of  it. 

In  the  winter  of  1881  we  had  a  special  election  for 
sheriff.  The  Republicans  had  their  convention  and 
nominated  a  candidate.  The  Democrats  called  a 
mass  convention  of  the  people  to  be  held  in  Rock  Is- 
land. T.  S.  Silvis,  a  candidate  for  sheriff  in  the  con- 
vention, wrote  to  Captain  William  Ransom,  of  Coal 
Valley,  and  to  me — we  two  being  Greenbackers  po- 
litically— asking  us  to  work  for  him  in  the  conven- 
tion. We  went,  and  worked  for  Silvis.  George  Henry 
and  a  man  by  the  name  of  Jarvis,  proprietor  of  the 
Rock  Island  House,  both  Democrats  of  Rock  Island, 
also  were  candidates. 

The  first  ballot  was  informal.  George  Henry  got 
the  most  votes.  The  Jarvis  campaign  was  managed 
by  lawyers.  When  they  saw  their  man  going  to  get 
158 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  HAUBE&G 

left  they  proposed  a  delegated  convention  and  the 
proposal  carried.  They  apportioned  the  delegates 
from  the  rural  districts  and  the  cities.  There  were 
seventy-eight  in  all  from  different  parties.  The  hall 
was  full  of  people.  The  George  Henry  and  Jarvis 
men  selected  the  delgates.  A  Jarvis  man  came  to  me 
and  said: 

"Will  you  be  a  delegate  here?"     I  said,  "I  can." 

"Will  you  vote  for  Jarvis?"  he  said. 

"No,  I  am  a  Silvis  man,"  I  told  him. 

"We  don't  want  you."     So  I  was  out. 

After  the  delegates  were  elected  they  moved  to  a 
room  by  themselves.  There  were  five  candidates  be- 
fore the  delegated  convention.  After  the  second 
ballot  George  Henry  came  to  me  and  said:  "I  told  my 
friends  to  vote  for  you ;  you  are  the  only  man  that 
can  beat  Jarvis  in  this  house." 

"Hold  on,"  I  said.     "I  am  for  Silvis." 

"Silvis  is  out;  he  can't  get  it,"  he  said. 

"I  don't  want  it,"  I  said. 

"Why?" 

I  said,  "I  am  a  greenbacker;  you  fellows  wont  sup- 
port me." 

"Yes,  we  will ;  we  are  under  honor  bound  to,"  he 
said. 

On  the  fifth  ballot  I  got  forty-two  votes.  That 
nominated  me.  They  called  on  me  for  a  speech.  I 
gave  them  a  talk  and  outlined  the  situation.  They  all 
seemed  to  be  satisfied.     I  told  the  editor  of  the  "Ar- 

lo9 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  HM  BERG 

gus,"  a  Democratic  paper,  to  insert  my  name  as  a 
candidate  for  sheriff.  I  did  not  see  my  name  in  the 
paper  the  next  day,  so  I  asked  him  why  he  did  not 
insert  my  name. 

"I  don't  own  this  paper,  I  am  a  hireling  and  I  got 
orders  not  to  insert  it,"  he  said. 

While  there,  Mr.  W.  Johnson  came  in  and  said, 
"Hauberg,  they  want  to  see  you  at  the  Rock  Island 
House."  When  I  got  there  Drake  met  me  and  said, 
"Hauberg,  here  is  $950.00,  and  Jarvis  will  add  $50.00, 
that  will  make  $1000.00.  We  will  give  you  this  money 
if  you  withdraw  as  a  candidate,  and  we  will  put  Jar- 
vis  on  the  ticket  and  you  support  him  and  work  for 
him  for  his  election.  If  you  don't  take  this  offer  they 
will  use  the  money  to  defeat  you."  I  said,  "Is  Jarvis 
in  the  house?  If  he  is,  call  him  here."  He  came.  I 
said,  "Mr.  Jarvis.  Mr.  Drake  says  you  will  give  fifty 
dollars  to  buy  me,  is  that  so."  Mr.  Jarvis  said  "yes." 
I  said,  "Mr.  Jarvis.  aren't  you  a  pretty  small  potato, 
you  being  a  candidate  in  the  same  convention 
that  I  was?"  '"I  didn't  ask  anybody  to  vote  for  me, 
but  they  nominated  me  without  my  consent  and  I 
am  a  candidate,  and  I  am  going  to  stay  if  I  don't  get 
but  one  vote  in  the  county.  You  fellows  haven't 
money  to  buy  me  and  it  would  not  be  an  honor  to  me 
to  be  elected  by  such  a  low-down  set  as  you  are." 

"By  God,  you  take  that  back,"  Jarvis  said. 

"I  take  back  nothing;  I  can  back  what  I  say;  you 
fellows   are   about   the   lowest   type   of   humanity    in 

160 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  HAVBERG 

America."  If  it  had  not  been  for  Phil.  Mitchell,  Cap- 
tain Burgh  and  Mr.  Lundy  taking  me  by  the  shoulder 
and  pulling  me  away,  I  think  there  would  have  been 
a  knockdown. 

It  was  a  short  campaign — ten  days.  Every  daily 
paper  in  the  county  fought  me.  We  had  one  Green- 
back weekly  that  supported  me.  I  got  beat ;  but  I  did 
not  feel  sore.  Moline,  where  I  was  partly  raised, 
a  Republican  town  four  to  one,  gave  me  a  majority 
of  five.  I  got  all  the  votes  in  my  own  town  but 
twenty,  out  of  two  hundred.  By  the  official  count  I 
was  beat  four  votes;  and  I  did  not  buy  any  votes  for 
beer  or  whiskey  or  cigars ;  but  money  and  saloons 
are  hard  to  fight  in  elections. 

In  1883  I  bought  twenty  acres  of  timber  land  for 
five  hundred  dollars.  In  1884  we  had  a  hail  storm 
that  destroyed  all  our  crops.  I  had  one  hundred  and 
fifteen  acres  in  small  grain  and  one  hundred  and  five 
acres  in  corn  and  forty  acres  in  meadow  and  did  not 
get  a  spear  of  any  kind  of  grain  or  grass.  I  bought 
$1600.00  worth  of  feed  and  seed  for  the  coming  year. 
In  '85  I  bought  forty  acres  of  land  in  Canoe  Creek 
township  for  $800.00.  In  1885  a  little  son,  Walter, 
was  born  to  us,    who  died  in  1886. 

In  1882  I  was  a  candidate  for  sheriff  on  an  inde- 
pendent ticket.  I  got  letters  from  all  parts  of  the 
county  to  be  a  candidate.  The  Republicans  had  nom- 
inated their  candidate,  and  so  had  the  Democrats. 
My  well-to-do   friends  in   Moline  induced  me  to  an- 

10 1 
Memoirs.     11. 


MEMOIR*  OF  MARX  D.  HAUBERG 

nounce  myself  —  they  would  finance  my  campaign. 
When  I  went  down  on  the  train  the  Republican  can- 
didate met  me  in  Moline  and  asked  me  to  get  off,  as 
he  wanted  to  see  me  at  the  drug  store.  I  went  with 
him. 

When  we  got  there,  he  said :  "I  want  you  to  an- 
nounce yourself  as  an  Indepenedent  candidate." 

"No,"  I  said,  "it  costs  too  much  money." 

"I  think  you  will  get  a  good  many  Democratic 
votes,"  he  said  "I'll  give  you  $50.00  if  you  will  run  as 
an  Independent  candidate." 

I  said,  "Give  me  the  $50.00  and  I'll  do  it." 

He  gave  me  the  $50.00.  I  had  the  cards  in  my 
pocket  to  take  to  the  newspapers  to  announce  myself 
a  candidate. 

A  week  after  my  announcement  I  was  in  Rock  Is- 
land, and  met  the  editor  of  the  German  paper,  the 
Volks  Zeitung.  He  had  written  to  me,  asking  me  to 
be  a  candidate.  He  said  he  would  do  all  he  could  for 
me.  The  same  day  the  saloon  committee  waited  on 
me,  to  see  what  I  would  do  with  them,  in  case  any  of 
them  were  prosecuted  and  convicted,  whether  or  not 
I  would  put  them  in  jail.  I  told  them  that  would  de- 
pend on  circumstances.  If  they  were  guilty  of  a 
crime  I  would  surely  put  them  in  jail;  if  it  were 
mere  malice,  why  I  would  investigate  the  case  and 
use  them  accordingly. 

"You  surely  don't  want  me  to  tie  myself  hand  and 
foot  to  you  folks,  do  you?"  I  said,  "I  can't  afford  to 

162 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  II Al  BERG 

do  that."     This  did  not  suit  them,  so  they  indorsed 
the  Democratic  candidate. 

I  made  a  canvass  of  the  lower  end  of  the  county 
and  got  acquainted  with  the  people.  Rock  Island 
county  is  about  seventy  miles  long  and  I  live  in  the 
upper  end,  two  miles  from  the  county  line.     Every- 


BHH 

t»nM 

w  ^  4^^^v*^<i!SsQriL   0m 

M^.-.-  •  Bn^AMJtoiihfid 

Fort   Armstrong  on   Rock   Island   as   I   knew   it. 

thing  went  well,  until  the  German  paper,  in  the  last 
issue  before  the  election,  stated,  "M.  D.  Hauberg  has 
withdrawn  in  favor  of  the  Democratic  nominee  and 
asks  his  friends  to  vote  for  the  Democratic  candi- 
date." This  paper  was  printed  on  Friday  and  the 
people  in  the  county  would  get  it  on  Monday,  and 
Tuesday  was  election  day.  The  time  was  too  short 
for  me  to  retract  this  statement.  After  the  election, 
when  the  votes  were  counted,  the  Democratic  can- 
didate beat  me  by  eighty  votes  and  I  beat  the  Repub- 
lican by  eighty-three  votes.  My  friends  in  the  upper 
end  of  the  county  stayed  with  me ;  they  knew  I  would 

163 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  HAUBERG 

not  sell  out,  and  they  could  not  be  bought  for  a  drink 
of  whiskey.  I  don't  think  there  was  a  voting  place 
in  the  county  but  it  had  a  man  with  a  two-gallon  jug 
of  whiskey  and  a  glass.  They  had  them  in  our  town, 
but  the  voters  routed  them  out. 

In  1886  I  was  a  candidate  for  state  senator.  The 
people  of  Henry  and  Rock  Island  counties  called  a 
mass  meeting,  to  be  held  at  Orion,  Henry  county.  A 
man  from  Wethersfield,  Henry  county,  was  a  candi- 
date for  state  senator.  He  wrote  to  me  to  come  to 
the  convention  and  nominate  him.  He  said,  being 
nominated  by  a  man  from  Rock  Island  county  would 
give  him  a  better  showing  in  the  county. 

I  went  to  the  convention  and  nominated  him,  and 
made  a  few  brief  remarks  as  to  his  qualifications  and 
the  kind  of  man  he  was.  A  man  from  Geneseo, 
Henry  county,  seconded  the  nomination,  and  gave  us 
a  flourishing  talk  for  about  a  half  hour,  telling  us 
about  the  gentleman's  good  traits  and  what  a  fine 
man  he  was.  A  man  from  Rock  Island  jumped  up 
and  said,  "Mr.  Chairman,  I  nominate  M.  D.  Hauberg 
of  Rock  Island  county.  Mr.  Hauberg  is  no  gentle- 
man ;  he  never  was,  and  I  don't  think  he  ever  will  be. 
We  have  too  many  gentlemen  in  office  now.  It  isn't 
a  gentleman  we  want — we  want  a  man  who,  when  he 
gets  up  before  a  crowd  and  gives  his  opinion,  does 
not  get  red  in  the  face;  a  man  who  doesn't  fear  any- 
body ;  a  man  that  you  can't  buy  or  sell.  We  are  elect- 
ing entirely  too  many  gentlemen." 

164 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  I>.  HAVBERG 

When  he  sat  down  I  got  up  and  thanked  him  for 
the  compliment  and  said,  "Gentlemen,  I  decline  to  be 
a  candidate;"  when  someone  moved  to  adjourn  for 
dinner. 

After  dinner  the  Rock  Island  fellows  said  to  me, 
"What's  the  matter  with  you?  We  don't  want  you. 
We  have  voted  for  you  as  often  as  we  want  to.  We 
will  try  to  work  in  another  candidate;  we  want  a 
little  fun  out  of  this.  You  stay  and  we  will  have  some 
fun." 

I  said,  "All  right,  I  will  stay  if  you  want  some  fun, 
but  don't  nominate  me." 

They  said,     "No,  surely  not." 

When  we  convened  after  dinner,  the  hall  was  full 
of  all  sorts  of  fellows — doctors,  lawyers,  farmers, 
tradesmen.  They  worked  in  another  candidate  and 
there  was  no  end  of  speechmaking.  Next  in  order 
was  balloting  for  state  senator.  When  the  votes 
were  counted  I  got  all  but  three. 

Then  I  got  up  and  said,  "Gentlemen,  you  have  done 
it.  If  you  want  me  elected,  just  pull  off  your  coats 
and  get  at  it;  I  don't  want  to  spend  a  day  or  a  cent 
of  money. 

"You  are  a  stranger  with  us,"  the  Henry  county 
folks  said,  "if  we  pay  you  for  your  time  and  ex- 
penses, will  you  come  over  and  get  acquainted  with 
our   people?" 

"Yes,"  I  said,  "but  don't  throw  away  your  money. 
There   is  no  show  for  an  election.     They  have  over 

165 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  HAUBERG 

seven  thousand  majority  over  me  and  the  Democrats 
have  no  candidate  and  some  of  them  will  vote  for  the 
other  candidate;  they  don't  like  my  political  com- 
plexion. I  am  in  favor  of  the  government  controlling 
the  railroads  by  a  commission  and  opposed  to  the  Na- 
tional banking  system,  and  in  favor  of  a  flexible  cur- 
rency issued  by  the  government,  and  the  common 
people  are  too  green  to  understand  it;  and  my  oppo- 
nent is  a  nice  fellow  and  a  bright  man."  My  oppo- 
nent was  secretary  of  the  Haxen  Steam  Company,  a 
concern  owned  by  the  railroad  company. 

In  September  they  sent  me  a  draft  for  $40.00  and 
asked  me  to  come  to  Kewanee  in  Henry  county.  I 
went  and  met  some  of  the  fellows  that  were  at  the 
convention.  I  told  them  that  perhaps  they  had  better 
call  together  some  of  the  friends — I  did  not  wish  to 
deceive  them — and  I  would  outline  my  policy  as  to 
what  I  would  do  and  would  not  do,  if  elected.  They 
called  a  meeting  at  some  hall.  I  think  they  had 
drummed  up  everybody  in  the  town,  for  the  hall  was 
full.  They  had  a  doctor  for  chairman,  who  had  been 
at  the  convention,  and  he  gave  me  a  flourishing  intro- 
duction. 

I  told  them  it  rather  embarrassed  me  to  face  such 
an  intelligent  crowd;  that  my  education  was  limited, 
having  acquired  the  biggest  part  of  it  driving  oxen 
to  a  breaking  plow ;  and  then  I  went  on  and  gave 
them  my  views — what  I  would  do  if  elected  and  what 
I  would  not  do.     Now  and  then  I  would  tell  them  a 

166 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  HAUBERG 

little  yarn  to  keep  them  awake.  It  seemed  that  I  had 
captured  the  crowd.  They  told  me  to  go  and  make  a 
talk  in  every  town  and  school-house  in  the  county — 
that  I  would  be  elected;  but  I  did  not  have  the  faith. 

I  told  my  friends  that  I  would  like  to  make  the  ac- 
quaintance of  my  opponent.  They  said,  "He  won't 
look  at  you ;  he  wears  a  stove-pipe  hat." 

"It  makes  no  difference,"  I  said,  "what  he  wears, 
I  want  to  see  him." 

I  went  to  see  him  and  introduced  myself,  and  told 
him  if  he  came  to  Rock  Island  to  come  and  see  me 
and  I  would  make  him  acquainted  with  some  of  his 
friends.  He  never  looked  up  at  me.  He  said  he  did- 
n't have  the  time  and  he  didn't  have  to ;  they  knew 
him. 

The  next  day  he  heard  of  the  meeting  we  had  had. 
That  kind  of  woke  him  up.  The  day  after  the  meet- 
ing I  started  for  home.  On  the  way  I  stopped  at 
every  town,  for  a  day,  to  get  acquainted.  At  the  sec- 
ond station  I  met  Mr.  Mock,  the  state's  attorney, 
whom  I  told  in  the  grand-jury  room,  if  his  father  had 
paid  for  his  education,  he  had  better  get  his  money 
back.  While  we  were  talking,  along  comes  my  oppo- 
nent. Mr.  Mock  introduced  him  to  me  and  said  to 
him,  "John,  don't  you  ever  talk  to  this  fellow  in  the 
presence  of  anybody  about  the  political  issues  of  the 
day."  My  opponent  and  I  got  real  chummy  before 
the  campaign  was  over.  Two  weeks  before  election 
he  told  me  I  would  beat  him. 

167 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  HAL' BERG 

"Don't  fool  yourself,"  I  said,  "you  will  get  there." 

"If  I  do,  it  will  be  your  fault,"  he  said. 

I  did  not  take  my  friends'  advice;  I  got  beat  eight 
hundred  votes.  My  county  gave  me  fourteen  hun- 
dred and  forty  majority.  I  could  have  been  elected 
if  I  had  taken  my  friends'  advice;  but  to  overcome 
such  a  large  majority  seemed  a  miracle  to  me.  There 
were  three  townships  in  Henry  county,  with  over 
seven  hundred  votes,  where  I  never  put  in  an  appear- 
ance. I  got  one  vote  in  one,  four  in  another  and 
seven  in  the  other. 

In  1877  I  became  a  Freemason  of  the  Third  De- 
gree. In  1880  I  was  a  charter  member  of  Elm  Camp 
Number  43  of  the  Modern  Woodmen  of  America.  In 
188 —  I  became  a  member  of  the  Farmers'  Mutual 
Benefit  Association  (the  same  as  Farmers'  Alliance). 
In  1890  I  was  elected  delegate  to  the  state  association 
meeting.  There  I  was  elected  a  delegate  to  the  na- 
tional meeting  to  be  held  in  Indianapolis,  Indiana ; 
but  I  declined  to  go  and  substituted  William  Letch  of 
Hampton  in  my  place,  to  which  they  agreed. 

At  Indianapolis  I  was  elected  a  delegate  at  large 
from  Illinois  to  a  meeting  to  be  held  in  St.  Louis  in 
February,  1891,  where  all  farm  and  labor  organiza- 
tions of  America  would  be  represented.  I  attended 
this  meeting — the  largest  I  was  ever  in.  Everybody 
was  there — even  the  women  advocating  women's 
rights.  There  were  over  sixteen  hundred  of  us.  Lots 
of  smart  men  were  there — even  such  as  Jerry  Simp- 
les 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  J).  HAl  BERG 

son  from  Kansas.  There  were  ninety-six  colored 
people  there  from  the  South — some  pretty  bright  fel- 
lows among  them.  I  was  on  a  committee  on  resolu- 
tions for  the  Farmers'  Mutual  Benefit  Association, 
which  was  in  session  a  half  day  and  night.  There  is 
where  we  organized  the  Populist  Party.  The  meet- 
ing at  St.  Louis  was  in  session  four  days.  These 
farm  organizations  have  educated  the  farmer*.  I 
know  the  time,  when  I  was  a  young  man,  when  only 
two  men  in  our  township  knew  enough  to  call  a  meet- 
ing to  order  or  put  a  motion.  Now  almost  any  school- 
boy can  do  it. 

From  1886  to  1897  I  bought  hogs  and  cattle  to  ship 
to  Chicago.  I  would  feed  one  load  of  cattle  one  year 
and  the  next  year  two  loads.  I  kept  from  thirty-five 
to  forty  cows.  I  raised  the  corn  and  fodder  to  feed 
them.  I  was  about  the  first  one  around  here  who  had 
a  Shorthorn  bull.  I  would  feed  from  two  to  three 
carloads  of  hogs  a  year. 

In  1890  I  was  a  delegate  from  our  Burr  Oak  Camp, 
No.  43,  of  Modern  Woodmen  of  America,  to  the  head 
camp  at  Springfield,  111.,  and  had  the  honor  of  nomi- 
nating Maj.  C.  W.  Hawes  of  Rock  Island,  for  the  head 
clerkship.  We  elected  him  and  he  continued  in  that 
office  24  years.  He  asked  to  be  relieved  from  it  in 
1914. 

My  wife  and  I  attended  the  World's  Fair  in  Chi- 
cago in  1893.  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Tom  Quick,  whose  farm 
joined  ours  on  the  east,  were  with  us.    We  got  rooms 

1G9 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  HAL' BERG 

at  a  private  residence.  The  ladies  roomed  together 
and  Tom  and  I  were  together.  On  October  9  was 
Chicago  Day,  the  biggest  day  of  the  fair.  That  morn- 
ing the  ladies  knocked  at  our  door  and  said  to  hurry, 
it  was  getting  late ;  we  must  be  on  our  way  to  the 
Fair.  None  of  us  had  a  watch  or  clock.  We  got  up 
in  a  hurry  and  when  we  got  to  the  restaurant  we 
found  it  was  only  2:00  o'clock.  We  got  our  breakfast 
and  went  on  down  to  the  Illinois  Central  station  on 
the  lake  front  and  had  to  wait  a  couple  of  hours  be- 
fore the  first  train  started  for  the  Fair. 

There  was  an  immense  crowd.  The  figures  showed 
they  had  716,881  in  attendance  that  day.  More  than 
twice  as  many  as  they  had  any  other  day.  We  car- 
ried a  lunch  for  dinner,  but  Mrs.  Quick  could  not  eat 
any  of  it.  There  was  no  chance  to  get  to  the  eating 
places,  it  was  so  crowded.  Towards  evening,  when 
we  wanted  to  go  to  our  rooms,  the  trains  were  so 
crowded  we  did  not  get  away  until  nine  o'clock.  It 
was  nearly  24  hours  between  meals  for  her.  She  had 
been  a  sickly  lady  for  many  years,  but  stood  the 
sightseeing  better  than  any  of  us.  She  was  the  only 
one  of  the  four  of  us  who  wanted  to  stay  longer.  The 
rest  of  us  were  glad  to  get  back  home. 

Father  died  March  14,  1886,  at  his  home  on  the 
farm  that  he  had  pre-empted  from  the  government  in 
1853,  in  section  eleven.  He  was  in  his  79th  year. 
Mother  died  October  10th,  1896,  in  her  86th  year. 
They  are  buried  in  the  Lutheran  cemetery  that  wa? 

170 


MEMOIRS  OF  MAR X  I).  HAVBERG 

laid  out  on  my  farm.  Their  children  who  survived 
them  were :  Myself,  the  oldest ;  Brother  Dave ;  Eliza- 
beth, wife  of  Dietrich  H.  Bracker;  Catherine,  wife  of 
Charles  G.  Walther,  and  Margaret,  wife  of  Fred  H. 
Schroeder.  My  oldest  sister,  Dores,  the  wife  of  Gott- 
lieb Stilz,  had  passed  away  some  years  before.  Their 
descendants  are  scattered,  and  in  all  kinds  of  occu- 
pations: farming,  teaching,  law,  medicine,  mercan- 
tile, farm  advisory  and  other  pursuits.  Pictures  of 
members  of  our  family  are  in  this  book,  except  Fath- 
er's.    He  left  no  picture  of  himself. 

In  1886  I  got  into  financial  trouble.  It  seemed  that 
every  note  I  had  signed  with  anybody  came  to  life 
and  I  had  it  to  pay.  Before  this  I  had  always  thought 
a  man  was  as  honest  as  he  looked;  but  I  found  out 
otherwise.  About  half  of  them  are  honest  and  the 
other  half  will  steal  if  they  get  a  chance ;  and  further- 
more, you  do  not  know  who  is  your  friend  until  you 
try  him.  I  had  friends  who  ought  to  have  thanked 
me  for  their  well-being — whom  I  had  helped  when 
they  were  in  trouble — who  did  me  all  the  dirt  they 
could ;  and  I  had  friends  who  helped  me  all  they  could 
just  to  see  how  much  they  could  get  out  of  me.  A 
prominent  Moline  plow  manufacturer  was  the  worst 
of  the  last-named  kind  that  I  had  any  experience 
with.  He  has  passed  to  his  reward,  and  I  will  not 
say  more  than  that  his  trying  to  beat  me  out  of  what 
I  had  cost  me  about  three  thousand  dollars.     I  threat- 


171 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  HAUBERG 

ened  to  shoot  him  once  which  helped  things  along 
toward  a  settlement. 

War  began  on  me  in  earnest  after  the  plow  manu- 
facturer got  his  hand  in.  I  borrowed  $2,000.00  of  A. 
B.  E.  Adams  of  Rapids  City,  a  gentleman  of  the  first 
class,  on  my  personal  property.  He  stayed  by  me 
and  even  borrowed  money  to  help  me,  when  I  got 
pinched  too  hard.  Before  I  got  everything  paid  up 
it  cost  me  over  $18,000.00  as  costs  and  interest;  but 
I  did  not  get  down  on  my  knees  to  anybody.  I  looked 
everybody  straight  in  the  face.  If  I  hadn't  —  and 
got  weak-kneeded  —  I  would  have  gone  under. 

When  trouble  comes  it  comes  all  over.  When  I 
was  in  the  worst  of  it  my  cows  got  in  the  corn  while 
we  were  away  at  the  Fair,  and  eighteen  of  them  died 
— good,  graded  Shorthorns.  My  hogs  got  the  cholera 
and  I  lost  two  hundred  forty-four  out  of  268,  each 
weighing  about  250  pounds,  but  I  saved  three  hun- 
dred acres  out  of  the  wreck,  of  what  we  had  been  ac- 
cumulating for  forty  years. 

When  I  come  to  look  around,  I  do  not  know  but 
that  we  have  about  as  much  as  the  best  of  the  other 
fellows,  and  a  good  deal  more  than  some  of  them. 

In  1912  my  wife  and  I  celebrated  our  Golden  Wed- 
ding anniversary.  We  had  a  big  crowd.  Among  them 
were  many  who  had  come  to  the  Upper  End  in  the 
'50s  and  had  helped  to  turn  the  wilderness  here  into 
one  of  the  finest  farming  districts  in  the  world. 
Among  the  guests   were   two   old   settlers   who   were 

172 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  l>.  HAUBERG 


above  ninety  years  of  age,  Henry  Sadoris  and  David 
S.  Metzgar.  We  had  one  couple  who  attended  our 
wedding  in  1862,  Mr.  and  Mrs.  William  Oltmann  of 
Hampton.  Our  Frels'  and  Hauberg  relatives  were 
present  and  others  we  had  known  as  neighbors  for 
nearly  sixty  years. 

The  Upper  End  did  well  in  the  World  War.  Every 
campaign  was  a  success — Red  Cross,  Y.  M.  C.  A., 
Liberty  Loans,  War  Savings  Stamps,  olds  clothes  for 
Europeans,  and  all  other  things. 

THE  RETURNED  SOLDIER  BOYS  AT  THE  C'OE  TOWN  BARBECUE. 


• 


Front  row,  left  to  right:  David  Crawford.  John  Smith,  Ed.  Slilinger,  Manly 
Boardman  and  Frank   Bnner. 

Middle  row:  Charles  Mead.  Raymond  Leathern,  John  Slock,  William  Schwen- 
neker,   Harry  Orr   and   Frank   Smith. 

Standing:  Ralph  Berht.  Freedom  Franklin.  Chester  Reeves,  Merrill  Trow- 
bridge, Harry  Engdahl,  Alfred  Bntzer.  Harry  Buckley.  Bernard  C.erken.  Daniel 
Sachau,   Charles   Seams  and   Leo   Brennan. 

17 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  II  LI  BERG 

Coe  Town  had  a  great  barbecue  celebration  for  the 
returned  soldiers,  at  Fairfield  school,  on  July  24th, 
1919.  A  two-year-old  beef  was  cooked  whole,  and 
everybody  got  some  of  it  for  dinner.  There  was  a 
large  crowd.  The  Red  Cross  ladies  served  a  fine  din- 
ner for  the  soldier  boys.    There  was  speaking  by  Rev. 


The  Coe  Town   Barbecue  for  the  World  War  soldiers  at   Fairfield   school  and 

chinch,  July  24,   1919.     Placing-  the  beef  upon  the  carving:  table. 

R.  W.  Babcock,  of  Moline,  who  had  served  with  the 
Y.  M.  C.  A.  in  France,  and  by  George  Coe,  who  was 
in  the  fighting  over  there  and  wTho  spent  some  time  in 
a  German  military  prison,  and  by  J.  D.  Barnes,  of 
LeClaire,  la.,  a  Civil  War  veteran,  who  spoke  about 
the  battle  of  Shiloh.  Music  was  furnished  by  the 
Hillsdale  Brass  Band,  and  by  the  United  Sunday- 
school  Band,  a  fife,  drum  and  bugle  corps,  of  Rock  Is- 
land.    The  field  north  of  the  road  and  west  of  Fair- 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  HAL  BERG 


field    church,    was    used    for    parking    automobiles. 
There  were  hundreds  of  them. 

It  was  fortunate  that  the  war  ended  when  it  did. 
In  our  neighborhood  so  many  of  the  young  men  had 


* 


'* 


THE  COE  TOWN  RED  CROSS  LADIES  WHO  SERVED  AT  THE  GREAT 
BARBECUE. 

Front  row,  left  I"  right:  Mrs.  A.  E.  Genung,  Miss  Ma!.el  Wells.  Miss  Klsie 
Wells.   Miss   Bertha    McConnell,    Mrs.   Joseph    McConnell,    Mi--    Haze]    McConnell. 

Middlt  row,  seated:  Mrs.  William  Moody,  Mrs.  Gust  Kruckenberg,  Mrs.  Harry 
(."In.    Mrs.    W.    II.    Dickson,    Mrs.    Allen    Meyer,    and    Mrs.   Thomas   McCall. 

Rear  run.  standing:  Mrs.  Charles  Nelson,  Mrs.  George  Guinn,  Mrs.  W.  I. 
Nicholson,  Mrs.  Charles  Sample,  Mrs.  A.  Saddoris,  Mrs.  John  Calsen,  Mrs. 
William  Groh   and  Mrs.   Charles   Broquist. 

gone,  that  on  an  average  we  had  only  one  able-bodied 
man  for  every  140  acres  of  farm  land.  This  was  not 
enough  to  keep  all  the  land  going. 

My  wife  and  I  made  it  a  practice  for  several  years 
to  attend  the  Old  Settlers'  meeting  at  the  Black  Hawk 

170 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  If  \l  BERG 

Watch  Tower.  On  September  3d,  1919,  I  was  elected 
president  of  the  Old  Settlers'  Society  of  Rock  Island 
County,  being  the  fifty-fourth  person  to  have  that 
honor.  Phil.  Mitchell  of  Rock  Island  is  custodian  of 
the  gold-headed  cane.  On  the  head  and  ferrules  of 
this  cane  is  engraved  the  name  of  every  Old  Settler 
Association  president.  It  now  has  the  following 
names,  and  the  year  that  each  was  president,  as  fol- 
lows: 

1st  P.  Gregg 1866 

2nd  J.  W.  Spencer 1867 

3rd  Jacob  Norris    1868 

4th  Lucius  Wells 1869 

5th  John  H.  Eby   1870 

6th  John  A.  Boyer 1871 

7th  David  Hawes   1872 

8th  Wm.  Bell 1873 

9th  A.  K.  Philleo   1874 

10th  W.  E.  Brooks 1875 

11th  Isaac  Negus   1876 

12th  James  Taylor  1877 

13th  Elton  C.  Cropper    1878 

14th  Frazer  Wilson    1879 

15th  N.   Belcher    1880 

16th  Charles  Laflin   1881 

17th  Adolphus  Dunlap 1882 

18th  Daniel  Mosher   1883 

19th  E.   P.  Reynolds    1884 

20th  John  Lusk 1885 

21st  Ira  L.  Whitehead    1886 

22nd  A.  M.  Hubbard   1887 

23rd  Orrin  Skinner   1888 

24th  Wm.  H.  Edwards    1889 

25th  L.  D.  Edwards   1890 

26th  Wm.   Miller 1891 

27th  D.  N.  Beal   1892 

28th  M.  Hartzell 1893 

177 
Memoirs.     12. 


MEMOIRS  OF  M  l-'.'.V  D.  HAl  BERG 

29th         S.  W.  McMaster    1894 

30th         James  G.  Blythe   1895 

31st  Thomas  Merrvman   1896 

32nd         Charles  Titterington 1897 

33rd         J.  L.  Bean 1898 

34th         Daniel  Gordon   1899 

35th  G.  H.  Edwards    1900 

36th  E.  J.  Searle    1901 

37th         Henrv  S.  Case   1902 

38th         R.  G.  Hollister 1903 

39th         M.  C.  Frick   1904 

40th  John  H.   Cleland    1905 

41st  Jacob  H.   Marshall    1906 

42nd         Josiah  G.  Heck    1907 

43rd  Cvrus  Valentine    1908 

44th  YVm.   Coyne    1909 

45th         Jas.  A.  Searle    1910 

46th         Wm.  H.  Lyford   1911 

47th         Mathew  Robison    1912 

48th         Geo.  W.  McMurphy   1913 

49th         Chas.  W.  Hawes   1914 

50th         David  Sears   1915 

51st  William   Payne    1916 

52nd         Thomas  Campbell   1917 

53rd         John  T.  Kenworthv   1918 

54th         M.   D.  Hauberg   1919 

I  was  personally  acquainted  with  every  one  of  the 
above-named  old-settler  presidents,  except  John  A. 
Boyer.  I  do  not  distinctly  remember  him.  Tom  Boll- 
man  of  Rock  Island  succeeded  me  as  president. 

The  same  evening  that  the  Old  Settlers'  meeting  was 
over,  in  1919,  I  started  on  a  trip  west,  to  visit  my  rela- 
tions and  my  old  friends.  I  arrived  in  Denver,  Colo., 
the  second  morning,  took  in  the  sights  of  the  city ;  had 
dinner  at  the  National  restaurant,  and  after  dinner  I 
took  a  street  car  for  Boulder.     Arrived  there  at  2:00 

ITS 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  l>.  HAUBERG 


0  '     1 

1      *^  ill 

1      jfr      '" 

;~                                  ^"^ 

MEMBERS  OF  THE   ROCK   ISLAND  COUNTY  OLD   SETTLERS'  ASSOCIATION 
AT  BLACK   HAWK'S   WATCH  TOWER,   IN   1920. 

Seated   from    left    to   right:   George    Lukens,    M.    D.    Hauberg,    Arthur   Mead, 
Win.  McConnell  and  E.  B.  McKeever. 

Standing:   M.  -J.   MeEniry,   M.    R.   Metzgar,    Geo.   E.   Bailey.  J.   W.   Welch,   J. 

Stuart,    Dart,    Daniel   Montgomery,    George    X.    Babcock,    Rufus    Walker,    A.    M. 
Brunei'  and  T.   J.    Murphy. 

o'clock  and  went  to  Green's  Garage.  My  son-in-law, 
William  T.  Schmoll,  who  runs  an  auto  express,  leaves 
there  at  3:00  p.  m.  for  the  town  of  Ward.  Arrived 
in  Ward  at  5:00  o'clock  and  stayed  over  night  at  the 
Columbia  hotel,  which  is  owned  by  my  daughter,  Mrs. 
Emma  Fairhurst.  I  visited  my  two  daughters,  Mrs. 
Schmoll  and  Mrs.  Fairhurst,  and  then  left  for  Peace- 
ful Valley,  situated  in  a  gulch  between  the  mountains. 
It  is  peaceful,  I  dare  say.  I  do  not  think  the  wind 
ever  blows  there.     A  Mr.  Roberts  has  a  little  store 


179 


MEMOIRS  OF   MARX  I).  HAl  BERG 

there,  and  a  hotel.  From  there  I  went  to  Allen's 
Park.  Not  much  doing  there,  but  they  have  a  good 
hotel.  From  there  I  went  to  the  Rocky  Mountain 
National  Park.  Had  dinner  at  Mr.  Enos  Mills'  hotel. 
It  is  rustic  like  and  is  very  fine.  He  also  has  a  very 
good  museum  of  mountain  relics.  From  there  I  went 
to  Estes  Park,  which  is  similar  to  an  eastern  town, 
being  mostly  on  the  level.  The  mountains  around  it 
are  very  rugged.  They  advertise  big  and  receive  a 
great  many  tourists.  Living  is  pretty  costly  there. 
They  have  a  very  fine  hotel  if  you  have  the  price : 
from  five  to  ten  dollars  a  clay,  and  not  much  to  be 
seen.  I  came  back  to  Ward.  In  my  opinion  Ward 
beats  them  all.  It  is  a  mining  town  up  in  the  moun- 
tains, over  9,000  feet  altitude.  The  people  there  are 
civilized.  They  have  two  good  hotels,  the  C.  &  N., 
and  the  Columbia,  and  for  sport  Ward  is  hard  to 
beat.  For  anybody  that  likes  fishing  they  have  Gold 
lake,  Brainerd  lake,  Tomlinson's  lake,  Red  Rock  lake. 
Stapps'  lake  and  Long  lake,  all  stocked  with  moun- 
tain trout  and  within  two  to  six  miles  from  town,  and 
the  mountains  are  rugged.  They  look  like  a  Holstein 
cow,  a  patch  of  snow  and  a  patch  of  green.  I  jumped 
across  a  creek  and  got  my  feet  wet.  I  didn't  jump 
far  enough.  I  pulled  off  my  shoe  and  sock  and  laid 
them  on  a  rock  on  a  snowbank  to  dry  while  we  ate 
our  dinner.  William  T.  Schmoll  has  a  garage  there 
and  has  a  touring  car  and  a  truck,  and  carries  pass- 
engers to  Boulder  or  any  other  place  over  the  moun- 

180 


UI-JMOfKS  OF  MARX   I).  BAUBERQ 


VETERANS  OF  THE   CIVIL  WAP.   OF   1861— '5,    WHO   WERE    PRESENT   AT 
THE    COE    TOWN    BARBECUE    IN    JULY,    1919. 

Front  row,  seated,  left  to  right:  J.  D.  Barnes,  J.  E.  Tavenner,  Stephen  Allen, 
Henry  Tomer,   Josiah    Stratton   and    Rev.    Henrj    C.    First. 

Rear  row,  standing:  James  Swisher,  Rense  C.  Heeren,  Cbarlej  Wilson,  Wil- 
liam Orr,  Pleasant  F.  Cox  and  Theudus   Ward. 

tains.  He  also  has  ponies  to  ride  where  you  can  not 
go  with  a  car.  Ward  also  has  a  very  good  store 
where  you  can  buy  anything  "from  a  needle  to  a 
threshing  machine,"  as  the  saying  is. 

From  Ward  I  went  to  Boulder  to  visit  my  old 
friend,  William  Danefaltzer,  formerly  from  Henry 
county,  Illinois.  Then  to  Denver,  where  I  visited 
with  my  grand-daughter,  Miss  Hazel  Schmoll.  She 
is  the  Assistant  Curator  of  the  Natural  History  sec- 
tion in  the  State  Museum.  We  took  in  the  sights,  the 
Chamber  of  Commerce,  the  U.  S.  Mint  and  the  city 

181 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  HALBERG 

parks.  We  also  saw  and  heard  President  Woodrow 
Wilson  speak  in  the  auditorium,  on  the  League  of 
Nations.  There  were  about  ten  thousand  people 
there  but  they  did  not  seem  to  be  interested  in  his 
talk.  It  was  his  last  speech  on  that  trip.  He  was  to 
speak  the  next  day  at  Pueblo,  Colo.,  but  he  cancelled 
the  date.  Some  said  he  was  sick,  and  some  said  the 
people  would  not  listen  to  him  any  more.  The  people 
here  were  strongly  opposed  to  his  plan  to  have  the 
United  States  join  the  European  countries  in  a  world 
league.  From  Denver  I  went  to  Tecumseh,  Neb.,  to 
visit  my  old  neighbor,  William  Hahn,  and  other 
friends  and  relatives  who  had  gone  out  there  from 
the  Upper  End  of  Rock  Island  county  in  the  late  '60s 
and  during  the  '70s  to  take  up  land  from  the  govern- 
ment. They  were  the  pioneer  farmers  there.  In  the 
early  days  they  had  some  hard  times.  Some  of  them 
lost  all  they  had  and  stayed  there  because  they  were 
too  poor  to  move.  About  all  my  relatives  and  friends 
there  are  farmers  and  live  in  the  country.  William 
Hahn  has  six  sons.  The  morning  after  I  arrived 
there  one  of  his  sons  took  me  around  in  his  auto  to 
visit  others.  My  cousin,  Christina  Hauberg,  now 
Mrs.  Fred  Broady,  has  six  sons,  and  I  was  taken 
around  to  visit  them.  I  stayed  overnight  with  the 
William  Broady's  and  he  took  me  in  tow  for  about 
three  days,  all  over  the  country  visiting  his  brothers 
and  other  friends.  I  stayed  over  night  at  my  cousin's, 
Mrs.   Broady,   and  visited  my   cousins,   Eggert   Hau- 

182 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  I).  If M  BERG 

berg  at  Graff,  Neb. ;  Henry  Hauberg  of  Johnson 
County,  Neb.;  and  James  Stoltenberg,  who  married 
a  cousin  of  mine,  Catherine  Hauberg.  She  is  now  de- 
ceased. On  Sunday  they  had  a  party  for  me  at  my 
cousin's,  Lena  Hauberg's,  now  Mrs.  Charles  Ernst. 
The  folks  we  had  missed  on  our  tour  over  the  coun- 
try we  met  there.  The  next  clay  I  had  dinner  with 
Mrs.  William  Ernst,  formerly  Louisa  Hahn,  at  Te- 
cumseh,  Neb.,  and  then  took  the  train  for  Omaha, 
where  I  visited  my  niece,  Mrs.  Odelia  Stilz  Kuhn. 
Her  husband  is  Rev.  Albert  Kuhn,  a  minister  there 
of  a  Presbyterian  church  and  professor  in  the  Univer- 
sity of  Omaha.  Also  called  on  Walter  Brandt  and  fam- 
ily, a  grand-nephew,  formerly  of  Port  Byron,  111.  I  left 
Omaha  at  5:30  p.  m.,  just  in  time  to  miss  the  riots  at 
the  court  house,  where  they  burned  up  about  all  the 
county  records.  The  county  jail  was  on  the  third  floor 
of  the  court  house  and  the  mob  was  trying  to  lynch  a 
negro  who  was  accused  of  assaulting  a  white  woman. 
The  mob  blew  up  the  court  house  to  get  the  negro. 

Next  I  went  to  Sioux  City  and  spent  a  night  with 
my  old  friend  James  Puck.  His  son  took  me  in  his 
car  next  morning  and  showed  me  all  over  the  city. 
From  there  I  took  the  train  to  Mitchell,  S.  D.,  to  visit 
my  daughter,  Mrs.  Rosena  Furland,  and  next  I  went 
to  Mt.  Vernon,  S.  D.,  and  visited  my  daughter  Ada, 
now  Mrs.  John  E.  Furland.  Here  I  stayed  a  week, 
and  left  for  Algona,  la.,  to  see  my  nephew  Herman 
Hauberg  and  wife.     Then  to   Waterloo,   la.,  to  visit 

18?> 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  HAL  BERG 

my  old  schoolmate  from  Germany,  Henry  Kahler, 
veteran  of  the  Civil  War,  and  retired  blacksmith. 
He  at  one  time  had  his  country  blacksmith  shop 
where  Adelphia  school  house  now  stands,  in  Coe 
township,  Rock  Island  county,  and  sold  the  shop  to 
Diedrick  H.  Bracker,  a  blacksmith  who  later  married 
my  sister  Elizabeth.  Then  I  went  to  La  Porte,  la., 
and  visited  the  Claus  Schleuter's,  Schnoor's,  Wand- 
schneider's,  and  James  Kahler's,  all  of  them  formerly 
Upper  End  people  of  Rock  Island  county.  Also  vis- 
ited Fred  Walther's.  Next  I  went  to  Mt.  Auburn, 
la.,  and  visited  John  Wiegant,  who  as  a  boy  stayed 
with  us  for  six  years.  While  there  Frank  Graven- 
horst  came  after  me  in  his  car  and  I  spent  three 
nights  and  days  with  him.  He  is  a  son  of  Captain 
Joe  Gravenhorst,  who  enlisted  in  1861  from  our  log 
house.  He  took  me  all  over  the  country  to  visit  the 
younger  generation.  Then  I  visited  old  friends  at 
Cedar  Rapids,  la. ;  then  to  Maquoketa,  la.,  to  visit 
Fred  Gurius,  formerly  of  Moline;  then  to  Davenport, 
la.,  to  visit  Catherine  Kahler,  now  Mrs.  Henry  Wiese, 
who  lived  next  neighbor  to  us  when  we  were  all  liv- 
ing in  log  houses  in  Sugar  Grove.  I  came  back  home 
about  the  first  of  November,  a  happy  man.  I  found 
all  my  relatives  and  friends  prosperous  and  well-to- 
do,  and  good,  moral  citizens.  This  America  is  the 
greatest  country  in  the  world. 

There  has  been  a  great  change  in  almost  every- 
thing since  we  came  here  in  1849.  At  that  time  the 
184 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  I).  EAUBERU 

Tri-cities  were  small  places.  I  knew  almost  every 
man,  woman  and  child  in  Moline  when  we  lived  there, 
the  town  was  so  small.  There  were  no  railroads — 
only  stage  coaches  and  steamboats.  There  was  no 
telegraph  or  telephone.  To-day  even  the  farmers 
have  telephones,  electric  lights  and  moving  pictures 


Threshing  outfit   1890.     The  C.    G.    Walther  and   Alt'.    Wainright    machine. 
Many  improvements  have  been  made  since  then. 


in  the  country  schools  and  churches.  Last  year  when 
I  was  at  Ward,  Colo.,  a  small  town  away  up  in  the 
mountains,  I  talked  by  'phone  with  my  folks  in  Rock 
Island,  Illinois.  It  sounded  as  plain  as  if  we  were 
next  door  to  each  other.  We  now  have  aeroplanes 
flying  east  and  west  over  the  'Docia  every  day,  car- 
rying mail  from  Omaha  to  Chicago. 

Our  first  harvesting  was  done  with  the  cradle  or 
scythe;  then  came  the  McCormick  and  other  makes 

185 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  HAI  BERG 

of  reapers  that  took  four  horses  to  pull  one  of  them, 
and  five  good  men  to  keep  up  with  it,  binding  "sta- 
tions." Next  was  when  our  neighbor,  James  V.  Bail- 
ey, got  a  Marsh  harvester.  Three  men  rode  on  the 
machine ;  one  of  them  drove  the  horses  and  two  did 
the  binding,  and  threw  the  bundles  off  when  they  had 


The   "Horse   Power"  ol    the  C.   G.   Walther   and   Alt.    Wainrighl    threshei    - 

them  bound.  Then  came  the  wire-binder.  It  was 
like  our  present  twine  binders  except  that  a  fine  wire 
was  put  around  the  sheaf  and  the  ends  twisted  to 
hold  it.  Then  the  Appleby  knotter  was  invented  and 
made  it  possible  to  use  twine. 

The  change  has  been  just  as  great  in  threshing  ma- 
chinery. It  was  not  many  years  before  they  improved 
threshing  machines  so  that  it  threshed  the  grain  from 
the  straw;  fanned  it  and  run  the  clean  grain  into  a 
bushel  measure,  and  elevated  the  straw  and  carried  it 

186 


MEMOIRS  OF  M.\h'\    I).  II  \l  BERG 

away  from  the  machine.  But  even  that  took  from  two 
to  a  half  dozen  men  in  the  straw  pile ;  two  band  cut- 
ters and  two  men  to  change  off,  feeding  the  machine. 
To-day  the  straw  is  blown  so  that  no  one  has  to  work 
in  the  straw  pile,  and  no  band  cutters  and  no  feeders 
are  needed  and  the  grain  is  automatically  meas- 
ured and  elevated  into  the  wagon,  clean  enough  for  the 
market.  If  it  was'  not  for  all  this  improved  machinery 
there  would  hardly  be  men  enough  in  the  United 
States  to  harvest  and  thresh  the  small  grain  grown  in 
this  country. 

In  fencing  the  farms  there  has  been  a  big  change 
also.  The  rail  fences  and  ditch-and-wall  fence  got  out 
of  style  when  the  saw  mills  began  to  turn  out  fencing 
in  enormous  amount.  We  got  white  pine  boards,  1x6 
inch.xlG  ft.  and  made  fences  four  and  five  boards 
high.  Not  a  fence  is  made  with  that  kind  of  material 
any  more.  About  the  same  time  that  we  used  pine- 
board  fencing,  we  began  to  set  out  Osage-orange 
hedges,  and  for  a  while  after  pine  boards  got  scarce 
at  least  two-thirds  of  all  the  fences  were  hedge,  and 
the  barbed  wire  was  invented.  To-day  the  farmers 
are  using  woven  wire  with  barbed  wire,  and  the 
hedges  are  being  grubbed  out  everywhere  because  it 
takes  a  lot  of  trimming  every  year  to  keep  them  look- 
ing good  and  in  repair,  and  besides  they  take  too  much 
strength  out  of  the  ground  near  the  fence. 

In  the  late  '60s  and  early  '70s  agents  began  coming 
around  to  sell  willows.     They  would  carry  cross-sec- 

187 


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MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  HAUBERG 

tions  of  willow  trees  showing  how  fast  they  grew. 
They  would  show  that  a  two-foot  saw  log  could  be 
grown  in  twenty  years,  and  lots  of  farmers  would  get 
bundles  of  slips  500  to  a  thousand  to  a  bundle.  They 
were  called  "Irish  gray  willows"  and  came  in  sticks 
about  14  inches  long.  We  set  them  out  mostly  in  low 
places  and  in  line  with  the  fences.  Lots  of  farmers 
who  had  prairie  farms,  without  timber,  grew  all  their 
own  stove  wood,  and  some  set  out  hard  wood  and  grew 
posts.  I  set  out  several  acres  of  soft  maples.  We  got 
the  seed  along  Rock  river  below  Hillsdale,  and  planted 
them  in  1867.  We  dug  up  small  maples  to  plant 
around  the  house.  The  largest  of  these  trees  now 
measures  nine  and  one-half  feet  around  at  its  smallest 
girth.  About  the  same  time  my  hired  man  and  I  came 
from  work  one  day.  He  had  a  willow  stick  and  I  had 
a  poplar.  We  stuck  them  in  the  ground  back  of  the 
stone  residence  and  they  grew.  The  poplar  died  years 
ago,  but  the  willow  is  still  there  and  is  nine  feet 
around  at  its  narrowest  girth. 

When  we  came  to  the  High  Prairie  they  had  stage 
lines  from  Chicago,  via  Dixon  and  Erie  to  Rock  Island, 
and  Galena  to  Rock  Island.  The  one  from  Chicago 
crossed  the  Docia  at  Hillsdale,  and  the  Galena  stage 
crossed  the  Docia  at  its  mouth  below  Albany,  but  when 
the  Mississippi  and  Rock  rivers  were  high  both  these 
stage  lines  crossed  at  the  Middle  Crossing,  which  is 
the  highest  ground  in  the  Docia  and  headed  for  Port 
Byron,  which  was  their  first  station  on  this  side.     A 

ISO 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  HAUBERG 

deep  roadway  is  still  to  be  seen  through  our  woods  in 
the  southeast  quarter  of  section  one,  Coe  township. 
The  old  road  from  the  other  side,  struck  the  bluff  at 
the  south  side  of  the  Docia  near  the  section  line  be- 
tween sections  five  and  six,  Canoe  Creek  township, 
then  came  westward  along  the  foot  of  the  rocks  and 
then  turned  southwest  across  Sugar  creek  and  through 
our  woods  in  section  one,  Coe  town,  and  on  across  our 
north  field  in  section  twelve,  and  struck  the  top  of  the 
hill  about  a  quarter  of  a  mile  south  of  the  Amos  Gold- 
en stone  house  in  section  eleven.  It  kept  on  the  top 
of  the  ridge  southwesterly,  and  crossed  the  corners  of 
the  four  sections — 9  and  10  and  15  and  16 — and  by  the 
Henry  Sadoris  house  in  section  16,  and  then  angled 
on  to  where  the  Coe  fair  used  to  be  held  in  the  north 
center  of  section  twenty,  where  it  followed  the  road 
to  Port  Byron  as  it  is  now.  They  always  drove  four 
horses  over  this  course,  and  if  it  was  extremely  wet, 
they  simply  carried  the  mail  on  horseback.  I  had  a 
horse  race  with  the  mail  carrier  once.  He  was  mak- 
ing fun  of  my  horse,  and  I  ran  him  and  beat  him. 
The  coaches  they  used  were  the  "Concord"  coach,  with 
the  driver  sitting  on  a  high  seat. 

Harvey  Tanner  was  one  of  the  stage  drivers.  He 
afterwards  settled  on  a  farm  in  Canoe  Creek  town- 
ship. His  son,  Charlie  Tanner,  has  a  driver's  con- 
tract.   It  is  a  printed  form.     It  reads  as  follows : 

"This  is  to  certify  that  Jacob  Graham  commenced 

190 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  I).  HAVBERG 

driving  for  M.  0.  Walker  on  the  1st  day  of  January, 
1858,  on  the  following  conditions: 

"Any  driver  who  gives  his  team  poisonous  medi- 
cines, or  dope,  or  receives  fare  without  accounting  for 
the  same,  shall  forfeit  all  dues,  and  be  subject  to  pay 
for  all  further  damage.  And  every  driver  who  leaves 
the  Way  Bill  is  to  forfeit  and  allow  One  Dollar  every 
time  the  Way  Bill  is  left.  Also  to  allow  on  account  of 
services  for  all  damages  occasioned  by  carelessness  or 
neglect ;  and  Five  Dollars  for  every  instance  of  under- 
taking to  drive  when  intoxicated  from  the  use  of  ar- 
dent spirits.  First  month's  wages  not  payable  until 
final  settlement.  No  payments  to  be  made  under  any 
circumstances,  except  this  certificate  is  presented,  and 
the  amount  paid  endorsed  at  the  time  of  payment. 
Wages  to  be  $14.00  per  month." 

The  above  certificate  has  two  endorsements  of 
money  received,  from  A.  B.  Emons,  who  probably  was 
one  of  the  cashiers  of  the  stage  company. 

One  of  the  greatest  changes  here  is  in  the  Docia.  It 
used  to  be  a  big  swamp.  You  could  stand  on  a  bog 
and  shake  an  acre  of  ground.  There  were  millions  of 
wild  fowl,  and  thousands  of  muskrat  houses.  Hunt- 
ers flocked  here  from  everywhere.  Some  made  good 
money  trapping  muskrats.  If  there  was  ice  they 
would  spear  the  muskrats  instead  of  trapping  them. 

In  the  spring  of  the  year  when  the  June  rise  came, 
the  Docia  would  often  be  a  big  river.  All  of  it  except 
places  like  Philleo's  Island  and  Buck  Island  would  be 

101 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  HAVBERQ 

under  water.  There  would  be  a  strong  current  at  the 
Middle  Crossing,  and  men  would  sometimes  stand  in 
it  with  shotguns  and  shoot  fine  big  buffalo-fish.  The 
water  would  sometimes  come  to  within  a  few  feet  of 
the  rocks  at  the  stone  quarry  (in  fractional  section  5, 
Canoe  Creek  township).  Once  I  saw  a  large  pine  log 
where  Andrew  Marshall's  lived.  It  had  come  in  there 
from  the  Mississippi  with  the  high  water. 

During  the  ordinary  dry  seasons  the  Docia  slough 
was  a  good  place  to  fish.  After  father  retired  from 
farming  it  was  his  favorite  pastime,  and  he  would 
donate  his  fish  to  the  neighbors  if  he  had  extra  good 
luck.  Our  whole  relationship  would  have  a  fishing 
party.  The  best  place  for  bullheads  and  pickerel  was 
at  what  was  called  "The  Catfish  Hole,"  in  the  north- 


it  fish  hole"  of  i] Id   'Docia   Slough. 


102 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  HAUBEBQ 

east  quarter  of  section  35,  Cordova  township.  We 
would  catch  sun-fish,  bull-heads,  pickerel,  and  some- 
times dog-fish  and  gar,  which  were  no  good.  The 
slough  had  a  sluggish  current,  with  clear,  open  water 
in  the  middle.  The  sides  were  lined  with  some  kinds 
of  moss  or  other  water  growth. 

Every  fall  or  winter  we  could  see  the  big  prairie 
fires,  when  the  rank  swamp  growth  would  burn.  Most 
of  the  farmers  would  make  wild  hay,  and  their  stacks 
would  be  in  danger.  One  time  I  went  down  to  save 
our  stacks,  and  my  wife  thought  I  was  burned  up.  I 
back-fired  around  the  hay  stacks  and  saved  them.  It 
was  not  easy  to  do  unless  you  knew  how.  The  fire 
would  get  away  from  you  in  the  wrong  direction. 

About  1896  they  built  a  dyke  at  the  mouth  of  the 
Docia,  below  Albany,  to  keep  the  high  water  of  the 
Mississippi  out,  and  put  in  a  large  pump  to  clear  the 
Docia  of  surplus  water,  and  at  the  Middle  Crossing 
another  dyke  was  built  to  keep  out  Rock  river  in  case 
it  got  high.  Drainage  ditches  have  been  put  through, 
and  to-day  some  of  the  best  farming  land  in  the  coun- 
try is  where  the  old  swamps  used  to  be. 

An  acre  of  Coe  Town  land  to-day  will  bring  as 
much  as  we  had  to  pay  for  a  quarter  section  when  we 
first  moved  here. 

Hillsdale,  III.,  January,  1923. 


193 


INDEX 


Abbott,  Alec,  62. 
Abbott,  Jim,  103. 
Adams,  A.  B.  E.,  172. 
Adelphia  school,  91,  184. 
Aeroplanes,  185. 
Albany,  111.,  156,  189,  193. 
Algona,  la.,  183. 
Allen,  Archie,  118. 
Allen,  Mrs.  Mary,  82. 
Allen,   Stephen,  181. 
Aliens  Park,  Colo.,  180. 
Allsbrow,  Lorrin,  74. 
Appleby,  Knotter,  186. 
Andersen,  Henry,  58. 
Anderson,  Mr.,  58. 
Andrews,  Lemuel,  101. 
Armstrong,  John  James,  28. 
Arndt,  Sam,  29. 
Arp,  John,  79,  86,  87. 
Ashdown,  Alex,  146. 
Ashdown,  Ed,  66,  117. 
Ashdown,  George,  91. 
Ashdown,  Henry,  117. 
Ashdown,  Mark,  145,  152. 
Ashdown,  Richard,  65. 
Ashdown,  William,  145. 
Askew,  Joe,  28. 
Askew,  Steve,  28. 

Babcock,  Rev.  R.  W.,  175. 
Bahlman,  Anna,  93. 
Bahlman,  Castina,  93. 
Bahlman,   James,  93. 
Bahlman,  Mrs.,  93. 
Bahlman,  Reimer,  93. 
Bailey,  James  V.,  186. 
Baker,  Volney,  66. 
Baker,  l!  F.,  88. 
Barstow,  50,   121. 
Barnes,  J.  D.,  175,  181. 
Baumgartner,  Roy,  174. 
Beal,  D.  L.,  177. 
Bean,  J.  L.,  178. 
Beardstown,  121. 


Beckman,    or    Beekman,    Hans, 

93,  103. 
Becht,  Ralph,  173. 
Belcher,  Nathaniel,  75,  177. 
Bell,  Geo.  W.,  30. 
Bell,  Roger,  95. 
Bell,  Rosa,  32. 
Bell,   Wm„   177. 
Benson,  Geo.  L.,  58. 
Berger,  — ,  29. 
Bettendorf,  52. 
Beyer,  Mr.,  25. 
Black  Hawk  Township,  155. 
Black  Hawk  Watch  Tower,  176. 
Blackman,  N.  J.,  139,  140. 
Bleuer,  "Old  man,"  136. 
Bluff  School,  82,  84,  87,  126,  148, 

154. 
Blythe,  James  G.,  178. 
Boardman,  Manly,  173. 
Bollman,  Tom,  178. 
Boulder,  Colo.,  178,  180,  181. 
Bowles,  Madison,  93,  158. 
Boyer,   John  A.,   177,   178. 
Bracker,  D.  H.,  75,  149,  171, 184. 
Bracker,  Herman,  188. 
Brady  St.,  177. 
Brainerd  Lake,  180. 
Brandt,  Walter,  183. 
Branding,  147,  148. 
Brennan,  Clarence,  174. 
Brennan,  Leo,  173. 
Broady,  Fred,  124. 
Broady,  Mrs.,  182. 
Broady,  William,  182. 
Brooks,  Wm,  27,  47,  54,  177. 
Broquist,  Mrs.  Charles,   176. 
Brown,  Gregory,  174. 
Bruner,  Frank,  173. 
Bruner,  Sam,  154. 
Brush  dam,  25,  53. 
Bryant,  George,  135. 
Buck  Island,  191. 
Buckley,  Harry,  173. 


lit." 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  IK  HAL  BERG 


Buckley,  Leo,  174. 
Burgh,  Capt.,  161. 
Burr  Oak  Camp,  169. 
Butzer,  Alfred,  173. 

Cains',  67. 

Cain,  Hiram,  62. 

Cain,  Wesley,  66. 

Cain,  Will,  188. 

Calsen,  Albert,  174. 

Calsen,  John,  188. 

Calsen,  Mrs.  John,  176. 

Camp,  James,  139,  140. 

Campbell,  Thomas,   178. 

Canoe  Creek,  66,  67,  73,  75,  79, 

92,  126,  127,  138,  151,  155,  161, 

190,  192. 
Carbondale,  W.  &  R.  Ry.,  70. 
Case,  Henry  S.,  178. 
Catfish   Hole,  192. 
Catrina,  45. 
Cedar  Rapids,  184. 
Cemetery,  Lutheran,  170. 
Chamberlain  &  Dean,  53. 
Chicago,  142,  143,  154,  169,  185, 

189. 
Chicago  Day,  170. 
Chicago  &  R.  I.  Ry,  102. 
Cholera,  85. 

Church,  59,  63,  81,  87,  88. 
Cincinnati,  24,  131. 
Civil  War,  122,  181,  184. 
Clark,  neighbor,  118,  119. 
Cleland,  John  H  ,  178. 
Cleveland,  111.,  53,  141. 
Cleveland,  111.,  mill,   134. 
Clinton,  la.,  151,  152. 
Coal  Valley,  155,  158. 
Coaltown,  49. 
Cody,  "Buffalo  Bill,"  36. 
Cody,  Sam.,  36,  37. 
Coe  Fair,  145. 
Coe,  George,  174,  175. 
Coe  Protective  Association,  148. 
Coe  Town,  40,  59,  65,  66,  72,  73, 

79,   80,   84,   89,   103,   126,    135, 

155,  176,  190,  193. 
Coe    Town    barbecue,    173,    174, 

175,   176,  181. 
Coldwater  River,  128. 
Cold  spell,  134. 


Colliersville,  127. 

Collins,  Mr.,  55. 

Colorado,  178,  182,  185. 

Columbia  Hotel,  179. 

Comfort,  Cy,  82. 

Comfort,  Louise,  82. 

Como,  111.,   78. 

Company   "M",   123. 

Concord  coach,  190. 

Cook  Co.,  142,  143. 

Cook,  Harris,  50. 

Cook,  Harry,  72. 

Cook,  Mrs.  Harry,  176. 

Cool,  Johnty,  32. 

Cools',  64. 

Cordova,  28,   32,   72,   83,   97,  98, 

99,  100,  103,  149,  150. 
Cordova   Township,   64,   155. 
County  grange,  154,   155. 
Coyne,  Wm  ,  17S. 
Cox,  Pleasant  F.,  181. 
Craig,  Charles,   174. 
Craig,  Robert,  174. 
Crawford,  David,  173. 
Cropper,   Elton  C  ,  177. 
Curtis,  Corinth   P.,  29. 

Dailey,  Jesse,  145. 

Danefaltzer,  William,  181. 

Dam,  Moline  brush,  25,  53. 

Davenport,  Iowa,  24,  25,  27,  33, 
37,  41,  49,  53,  55,  59,  60,  93, 
96,  100,  114,  121,  124,  126,  129, 
130,  135,  145,  184. 

Davenport,  Bailey,  25,  30,  55. 

Davenport,  Col.,  55,  57. 

Davenport,  Henry,  55. 

Davenport  House,  57. 

Davenport,  Lizzie,  55. 

Davis,  Bill.  29,  34. 

Dayton,  O.,  55. 

Dean  &  Chamberlain,  53. 

Deer,  55,  161,   119. 

Deere,  Charles,  107. 

Deere,  John,  51,  52,  111. 

Democrats,  158,  161,  162,  166. 

Denver,  Colo.,  178,  181. 

Decatur,  Ala.,  12,  13,  22. 

Denmark,  5,  9. 

Diamond  Jo,  97,  98. 

Dibbern,  35. 


196 


MEMOIIiK  OF  J/.1A'\    I).  HAUBERQ 


Dibbern,  Charles,  35,  59. 

Dibbern,  C.  H.,  105,  106,  112. 

Dickson,  Mrs.  W.  H.,  176. 

Dillins',  64,  93. 

Dillon,  C,  139,  140. 

Dixon,   111.,   71,  72,  73,   189. 

'Docia  (Meredocia),  76,  80,  127, 
147,  149,  150,  151,  153,  185, 
189,   190,  191,  192,  193. 

Dodge,  George,  123. 

Doescher,  Rev.  F.,  83,  87. 

Donahoo,  E.  C,  73. 

Donaboo,  John,  73. 

Donelson,  Fort,  123. 

Drainage  ditches,   193. 

Drake,  Mr.,   160. 

Drury  Township,  155. 

Duck  Creek,  44. 

Dunker,  Mr.,  51. 

Dunlap,  Adolphus,  177. 

Dyke,  193. 

Dysart,   Sam,  142. 

East  Moline,   30. 

Ely,  John   H.,   177. 

Eckhardt,  F.,  136. 

Edgington  Settlement,  87. 

Edward,  Prince  of  Wales,  80. 

Edwards,  G.  H.,  178. 

Edwards,  L.  D.,  155,  158,  177. 

Edwards,  Wm.  H.,  177. 

Eges',  64. 

Eipper,  Vergil,  174. 

Elm  Camp,  M.  W.  A.,  168. 

Elmschenhagen,  10. 

Elfsleth,  134. 

Engdahl,    Harry,    173. 

England,  9. 

Enterprise  school,  80,  126. 

Erie,  111.,  103,  151,  189. 

Ernst,  Mrs.  Charles,  183. 

Ernst,  William,  136. 

Ernst,   Mrs.   William,  183. 

Estes  Park,  180. 

Fairfield,  65,  66,   120,   175. 
Fairhurst,  Mrs.  Emma,  179. 
Farmer's  Alliance,  168. 
Farmer's  Mutual  Benefit  Assn. 

87,  168,  169. 
Farmer's  Store,  134. 


Feaster,  Ida,  74. 

Feaster,  Wm.,  74,  138. 

Fewces,  6,  7,  67,  68,  187. 

Ferkel,  Mr.,  55. 

Fielding,  Mr.  and  Mrs.,  135. 

Fife,  John,  65. 

First,  James,  58. 

First,  Rev.,  Henry  C,  79,  181. 

Five  Points,  58. 

Fleming,  Clyde,  84. 

Fleming,  Dr.  Wilson,  84,  145. 

Flickenger,  Jacob,  64. 

Flickenger's,  64,  65. 

Forsythe,  Earl,  174. 

Fort  Armstrong,  56,  163. 

Fort  Henry,  123. 

Fourth  Illinois  Cavalry,  123. 

Fowler,  Wm.,  84. 

Fowler,  Tom,  62,  66. 

Frankfort-on-the-Main,  134. 

Franklin,  Freedom,  173. 

Frels,  Alvin,  67,  79. 

Frels,    Anna    Margaret,    50,   88, 

133. 
Frels,  Fred,  50. 
Frels,  Henry,  49,  50,  87,  88,  133, 

134,  158,  173. 
Frels,  Henry    (a  nephew),  124. 
Freemasons,  87,  168. 
Frick,  Abram,  54. 
Frick,  M.  C,  178. 
Frick's  Hill,  54. 
Friedrich,  Rev.  G.  Chr.,  86,  87. 
Furland,  John  E.,  183. 
Furland,  Rosena,  183. 

Galena,  27,  60,  134,  189. 
Gamble,  Mr.,  29. 
Garrison's,  64. 
Garrison,  Thurlow,  62,  66. 
Gates,  Fred,  63. 
Geneseo,  69,  77,  164. 
Genung's,  64. 
Genung,  Mrs.  G.  E.,  176. 
Genung,   Cassius,   188. 
Genung,  George,  123,  145. 
Gerken,  Bernard,  173. 
German  paper,  162,  163. 
German  Lutheran,  81,  82. 
Germantown,  128. 


191 


MEMOIRS   OF  MARX  D.  HAVBERO 


Germany,  5,  14,  15,  22,  25,  45, 
67,  70,  85,  123,  127,  131,  134, 
136. 

Gest,  Judge  W.  H.(  125. 

Gilbert,  Mr.,  53. 

Glenn,  Major,  155. 

Gode,  Henry,  151. 

Golden's,  64,  82. 

Golden,  Amos,  75,  79,  82,  136, 
190. 

Golden,  Claire,  174. 

Golden,  William,  75. 

Golden  wedding,  172. 

Goose  Creek,  38. 

Gordon,  31,  32. 

Gordon,  Daniel,  31,  178. 

Gottsche,  Paul,  79,  93. 

Graff,  Neb  ,  183. 

Graham,  Jacob,  190. 

Grangers,  87,  154,  156,  158. 

Grant,   Judge,   33. 

Grantz,  Mrs.  Conrad,  58. 

Gravenhorst,  Joe,  123,  184. 

Gravenhorst,  Frank,  184. 

Graves,  squire,   15,  19. 

Grensman,   John,   188. 

Greenbackers,  158,  161. 

Gregg,  Dr.  Patrick,  124,  177. 

Grey,  Charley,  97. 

Griese,  Clement,  9. 

Griese,  Doris,  10,  11,  21. 

Griese,  Margretha,  109. 

Griese,  Marx  Clement,  10. 

Griese,  Marx. 

Griffin,  Mr.,  49. 

Grilk.  Claus,  58. 

Groh,   Mrs.  Wm  ,  176. 

Gruber.   Rev.,   83,   87. 

Guinn,  George,   80,  114. 

Guinn,  Mrs.  George,  176. 

Cumber,  Nick,  125. 

Gurins,  Doris,  111. 

Gurins,  Fred,  111,  184. 

Hahn,  Doris,  79. 

Hahn,  Elizabeth  or  Louisa,  79, 

136,  183. 
Hahn,  James,  78. 
Hahn,  John,  78. 
Hahn,  John  Jr.,  78,  139. 
Hahn,  William.  78,  182. 


Hahn,  Wolf,  60. 

Hamburg,   9. 

Hampton,  49,  88,  111,  116,  134, 
155,   168,   173. 

Hampton  Bluff,  49,  86,  87,  88, 
120,  124. 

Hanssen,  96. 

Harbison,  Robert,   71. 

Harms,  Lothar,  136. 

Harris,  Frank,  156. 

Harte,  W.  H„  80,  81. 

Hartzell,  M.  J.,  30,  51,  177. 

Harvest  Home,  138. 

Hasson,  Alex.,  79. 

Hasson,  George,  79. 

Hasson,  James,  79. 

Hasson,  John,  79. 

Hast,  Claus,  41. 

Hauberg,  Ada,   183. 

Hauberg,  Catherine  (sister), 
85,  122,  171. 

Hauberg,  Catherine  (cousin), 
183. 

Hauberg,  Christina,  182. 

Hauberg,  Doris,  10,  28,  120,  171. 

Hauberg.   Eggert,    134,   182. 

Hauberg,  Elizabeth,  30,  58,  85, 
122,   171,   184. 

Hauberg,   Henry,   183. 

Hauberg,  Herman,  183. 

Hauberg,  Jergen  D.  (Dave),  10, 
28,  33,  46,  60,  67,  73,  85,  95, 
117,  122,  125,  133,  136,  139, 
140,   146,   171. 

Hauberg,   .Joachim,  9. 

Hauberg,  John  D.  (Father),  6, 
15,  17,  18,  20,  22,  23,  24,  25, 
28,  32,  33,  59,  60,  62,  67,  71, 
73,  76,  77,  81,  82,  85,  89,  90, 
92,  102,  109,  131,  170,  192. 

Hauberg,  Mrs.  John  D.  (Moth- 
er), 4,  17,  21,  28,  32,  33,  68, 
80,  85,  170. 

Hauberg,  John  D.  G,  125. 

Hauberg,   John  H.,  21. 

Hauberg,  Lena,  10,  13. 

Hauberg,  Lena    (cousin),  183. 

Hauberg,  Lpuis  D.,   188. 

Hauberg,  Margaret,  65,  85,  122, 
134,  171. 

Hauberg,  Marx   (uncle),  7,  8. 


L98 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  I).  HAUBERQ 


Hauberg,  Mrs.  M.  D.,  3,  176. 
Hauberg,  Rosena,   183. 
Hauberg,  Walter  M.,  161. 
Hawes,   Major  C.  W.,   169,   178. 
Haxen  Steam  Co.,  166. 
Heck,   Josiah  G.,   178. 
Heeren,  Rense  C,  181. 
Heerens',  121. 
Henry   Co.,    153,   164,    165,    166, 

168,  181. 
Henry,  Fort,  123. 
Henry,  George,  158,  159. 
Higb  Prairie,  60,  70,  79,  80,  83, 

86,  88,  189. 
Hillsdale,  121,  144,  189,  193. 
Hillsdale  Brass  Band,  175. 
Hillsdale  Fair,  139,  145,  189. 
Hobarts',  188. 
Hofer,  Chris.,  136. 
Hofer,  John,  135. 
Hoke,  Dr.,  154. 
Hollister,  Ab  ,  145. 
Hollister,  R.  G.,  178. 
Hollister,  Rube,  65. 
Holmes,  Daniel,  50. 
Holmes,  George,  E.,  84. 
Holstein,  67. 
Horse  power,  186. 
Hubbard,  A.  M.,   177. 
Hunters'  Lodge,  79,  80. 
Huntley,  Geo.,  174. 
Huntoon,  Jonathan,  48. 

Illinois,  59. 

Illinois  Central  Ry.,  170. 

Indiana,   168. 

Indinapolis,  168. 

Indians,  37,  38,  69,  119,  137,  138. 

Iowa  City,  la  ,  69,  100,  101. 

Jack  Oak,  99. 

Jackson  Co.,  150. 

Jackson,  Wm„  52. 

Jarvis,  158,  159,  160. 

Jersey  Row,  97. 

Johnson  Co.,  183. 

Johnson,   Mr.,   58. 

Johnson,  John  A.    (Big  John), 

139,  140,  14G. 
Johnson,  Peter,  188. 
Johnson,  Col.  Wm.,  64,  91,  135. 


Johnson,  W.,  160. 
Joslin,  N.  B.,  139. 
Joslin  Fair,  141. 

Kahler,  Catherine,  78,  184. 
Kahler,  Henry,  60,  67,  78,  123, 

184. 
Kahler,  James,  78,  123,  183. 
Kahler,  John,  78. 
Kahler,  Matthias,  58,  78. 
Kentucky,  12,  22. 
Kenworthy,  John  T.,   178. 
Kerr,  James,  174. 
Kewanee,  111.,  166. 
Kiel,  5,  '7,  8,  9. 
Kingston,  Tenn.,  13,  16. 
Kirche,  Stadt,  9. 
Klattenhoff,  Henry,  132. 
Klebe,  Gust,  124. 
Knock,,  Henry,  60,  64. 
Knoxville,   13. 

Kramhoft,  Christian,  85,  86,  93. 
Kramhoft,  Mrs.,  85. 
Krabbenhoeft,  C,  72,  78. 
Krabbenhoeft,  Ira,  78. 
Krebs,  John,  79. 
Kruckenberg,  Mrs.  Gust,  176. 
Kuehl,  Mrs.  Henry,   87. 
Kuhn,  Rev.  Albert,  183. 
Kuhn,  Odelia  Stilz,   183. 
Kyte,  Chas.,  155,  156,  157. 

Lambert,  Calvin,  82. 

Lambert,  John  L.,  79. 

Laflin,  Charles,  177. 

La  Grange,  128. 

Lamp,  Mr.,  55. 

Lands,  Military  Bounty,  71. 

Land  office,  72. 

Langmaak,  Claus,  58. 

Langmaak,  Hans,  58. 

Lanterns,  132. 

La  Porte,  la.,  184. 

La  Rue,  Geo.  W.,  145,  150. 

La  Rue.  James,  154. 

La  Rues,  64,  66. 

Lascelles,  Henry,  89. 

Launspach,  134. 

League  of  Nations,  182. 

Leathern,  Raymond,  173. 

Le  Claire,  Antoine,  55,  56. 


1!)!) 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  HAVBERG 


Le  Claire  House,  56. 

Le  Claire,  la.,  36,  83,  84,  96,  175. 

Lee  Co.,  142. 

Legnat,  Mr.,   155. 

Letch,  Wm.,  168. 

Lewis,  Mrs.,  25. 

Liberty  loans,  173. 

Liitt,  Katie,  55. 

Liitt,  Wolf,  25. 

Lime  kiln,  157. 

Lincoln   Township,   42. 

Lindau,  123. 

Liphardt,  Herman,  139,  146. 

Liphardt,  John  A.,  79,  139,  140, 

144,  146. 
Littig,  John,  52. 
Long  Lake,  180. 
Loptien,  Christian,  57. 
Loptien,  James,   111. 
Loptien,   Joachim,  58. 
Louisville,   24. 
Lovelace,  Melvin,  174. 
Lower  rapids,  70. 
Lukens,  Geo.,  179. 
Lundy,  Mr.,  161. 
Lusk,  John,  71,   177. 
Lustigen  Bruder,  5. 
Lutheran,    German,    81,    83,    87, 

88. 
Lutheran,   Swedish,  30,  88. 
Luther's  Catechism,   86. 
Lutz.  Mr.,  147,  148. 
Lyford,  Dr.  Wm.  H  ,  84,  178. 
Lynch,  N.,  71. 

McCall,  Hugh,  145. 
McCall.   Thomas,   145. 
McCall,  Mrs    Thomas,  176. 
McConnell,  Bertha,  176. 
McConnell,  Hazel,  176. 
McConnell,  Mrs.  Joseph,  176. 
McConnell,  William,  179. 
McCormick,  185. 
McEniry,  John,  60. 
McEniry,  Matt.  J.,  60,  179. 
McEniry,  Mollie,  60. 
McEniry,  William,   30,   60. 
McEniry,  William  Jr.,  60. 
McFaddem,  Edward,  89. 
McGuffy's  school  books,  32,  82. 
McKeever,  E.  B.,  179. 


McMaster,  S.  W.,  178. 
McMurphy,  George  W.,  178. 
McNeal,  George,  153. 
McNeals',   118. 
McRoberts,  65,  145. 
McRcberts,  James,   66. 
Madison,   Fielding,  52. 
Mandler,  Catherine,  134. 
Mangelsdorf,   Anna,   88. 
Maquoketa,  184. 
Markets,  7. 
Marshall,  Andrew,  192. 


Marshall 
Marshall 
Marshall 


ney),   75,  82,  97 
Marshall 
75,  103 


Marshall 

75,  103 
Marshall 
Marshall 

Bill"), 
Marshall 
Marshall 
Marshall 
Marshall 

74,  94. 
Marshall 
Marshall 
Marshall 
Marshall 
Marshall 
Marshall 
Marshall 
Marshall 
Marshall 
Marshall 
Marshall 

92. 
Marshall 
Marshall 


Marshall 

75. 
Marshall 
Marshall 


s  Cordova,  67,  74. 
Charles   B.,  75,   149. 
Charles     B.      (attor- 


George,  66,  75. 
John    ("Gooseneck"). 


Johnty,  75. 
William    "(Squire 
75,  97,  103. 
Lawyer,  74. 
Anna,   74. 
Brice,  62. 
Isaiah,  62,  66,  67,  73, 

Jane,  74. 
Joe,  62. 
John,  62. 
Mary,  74. 
Priscilla,  74. 
Sarah,  74. 
William,   62. 
s  Prairie,  74. 
Henry,  75. 
Jacob,  75  ,178. 
John,   74,    79,   90,   91, 

Lettie,  75. 
William     G.    ("Billy 


G."),   67,  73,  75,  77. 


Theodore     ("Dora"), 


s',  64,   74,  82. 
s  Grove,   138. 
Marsh  Harvester,  186. 
Martin,    David    M.,    61,    62,    67, 

140,  146,   149. 
Martin,  James,  62. 


li(l(l 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  HA  I  BERG 


Martin,  Joe,  62,  67,  139. 

Martin,  John,  62. 

Martins',  67. 

Martin's  Grove,  139. 

Mathis,   Mr.,  139. 

Mead,  Arthur,  32,  179. 

Mead,  Charles,  173. 

Melodeon,  84. 

Memphis,  129. 

Mennicke,  Rev.  C.  A.,  87,  88. 

Meredocia,  76. 

Merryman,  Thomas,  178. 

Metzgar,  David,   64,  173. 

Metzgar,  M.  R.,  179. 

Meyer,  Mrs.  Albert,  176. 

Meyer,  Dr.  R.  C.  J.,  111. 

Middle    Crossing,    72,    103,    149, 

151,  189,  192,  193. 
Milan,  35. 

Military  Bounty  land,  71. 
Mill,  Cleveland, 
Mill,  William,  92,  149. 
Mill,  Mrs.  Wm.,  32. 
Miller,  Henry,  124,  125. 
Miller,  William,  177. 
Mills,  Enos,  180. 
Milwaukee,  131. 
Minute  men,   149,  150,  151. 
Mississippi   River,    69,    81,    103, 

134,  152,  189,  192. 
Mississippi,  State  of,  128. 
Missouri  Synod,  82,  87. 
Mitchel,  George,  151,  152. 
Mitchell,  Phil,  161,  177. 
Mitchell,  So.  Dak.,  183. 
Mock,  Mr.,  167. 
Modern  Woodmen  of  America, 

87,  168. 
Moline.   111.,   22,   25,   26,   27,   29, 

30,   31,   47,   49,  53,  54,   56,  62, 

69,  71,  77,  78,  87,  92,  97,  103, 

112,    120,    132,    153,    161,    162, 

175,  184,  185. 
Moline  City  Hall,  31,  47,  60. 
Moline  Plow  Co.,  47. 
Moline  Tool  Co.,  28. 
Moline  Wagon  Co.,  54,  58. 
Montgomery,   Daniel,   179. 
Montgomery,  Thomas,   174. 
Montgomery  Ward   &   Co.,   154. 
Moody,   John,   73. 


Moody,  Mrs.  William,  176. 
Moore,  George,  123. 
Morgan,  Isaac,  52. 
Morgan,  Dr.  J.  W.,  53,  154. 
Morgan,  Wallace,  174. 
Mosher,  Daniel,  177. 
Mt.  Auburn,  la.,  184. 
Mt.  Joy,  la.,  38. 
Mt.  Vernon,  So.  Dak.,  183. 
xMulholland,  John,  152. 
Mumm,  Hans,  111. 
Murphy,   Mike,   65. 
Murphy,  Thomas  J.,  179. 
Muscatine,  87. 
Muskrats,   76,  191. 

Naeve,  August,  78. 

National   banking   system,    166. 

Negus,  Isaac,   177. 

Nelson,  Mrs.  Charles,  176. 

Nelson,  Ed.,    188. 

Nerga,  14,  15,  20. 

New  Jersey,  64,  83,  97. 

New  Orleans,  24. 

New  York,   11,  64. 

Nicewanger,  Daniel,  48,  149. 

Nichols,  John,   58. 

Nichols,   Mina,   58. 

Nicholson,  Mrs.  W.  D.,   176. 

Noel,  Mr.,  3  7. 

Norris,  Jacob,  177. 

Oath  of  office,   89. 

Obermeier,   25,  27,  30,  77. 

Ohio,  64,  153. 

Ohio  River,   134. 

Old    Settlers'    Association,    176, 

177,  178,  179. 
Oldenburg,  Germany,  134. 
Oliver,  Leslie,  174. 
Oltmann,  William,  173. 
Omaha,  183,  185. 
Opendike,  Henry,  135,  139,  140. 
Orion,  164. 
Orr,  Harry,  173. 
Orr,  William,  181. 
Osage  orange,  187. 
Osborn,  Charles,  188. 
Owens,  Fred,  72,  73,  149. 

Paducah,  12,  22,  23. 
Paris  Exposition,  142. 


I'D! 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  H  Alii  ERG 


Patterson,  29,  30. 

Payne,   William,    178. 

Peaceful  Valley,  179. 

Pearsall,  Jere,  135,  145,  154. 

Pearsall,  Luther  S.,  135,  145. 

Pearsall,  Nathaniel,  66. 

Pearsall,  Deacon  Wm.  C,  135. 

Pearsall,  Willie,  67. 

Pearson,  Jerry,  73. 

Pender,  or  Penter,  13,  18,  22. 

Penrock  ferry,  14. 

Pennsylvania,  66. 

Penn  Township,  76. 

Petersen,  40. 

Philadelphia,   11,   66,   79. 

Philleo,  A.  K.,  177. 

Philleo's  Island,  103,  149,  151, 
191. 

Pitts,  Gilbert  &  Pitts,  53. 

Pittsburg,  11,  12. 

Pittsburg  Landing,  123. 

Populist  Party,  169. 

Port  Bvron,  111.,  28,  53,  63,  65, 
70,  73,  75,  76,  77,  81,  84,  86, 
94,  95,  96,  97,  116,  118,  120, 
121,  123,  152,  153,  154,  157, 
183,  189,  190. 

Port  Byron  bluffs,  86. 

Port  Hudson,  129. 

Prairie  fires,  81,  193. 

Pratt,  Ira,  32. 

Preetz,  5,  9,  25. 

Prescott,   Rev.  Asa,   83. 

Priest,  Fritz,  48. 

Priest,  John,  48,  49. 

Prince  of  Wales,  80. 

Probstei,  33,  41,  121. 

Prussia,  5. 

Puck,   James,   183. 

Pueblo,  Colo.,  182. 

Quick,   Garrett,   153. 
Quick,  Henry,  82. 
Quick,  Herbert,  188. 
Quick,  John,  82,  150,  152. 
Quick,  Phoebe,  82. 
Quick,  Raymond,   188. 
Quick,  Tom,  SI,   169,   170. 
Quick,  Tunis,  66,  81,  82,  83. 
Quick's,  64,   67. 


Railroad,  11,  12,  22,  69,  70,  99, 

101,  102. 
Raisdorf,   5,  6,   7,  123. 
Ransom,  Capt.  Wm.,  158. 
Rapids  City,  111.,  172. 
Reapers,  186. 
Rebellion,  81. 
Red  Cross,  173,  175,  176. 
Red  Rock  Lake,  180. 
Reese,  Charley,  103,  111. 
Reeves,   Chester,   173. 
Reimers,  Claus,  111. 
Reimers,  Mrs.  Reimer,  58. 
Republicans,  158,   161,  162. 
Reynolds,  E.  P.,  177. 
Riewerts,   Jake,   188. 
Riewerts,  John,   188. 
Riewerts,  William,  85. 
Road  Commissioners,  89. 
Roberts,  Charley,  123,  128. 
Roberts,   Mr.,  179. 
Robinson,  Floyd,  174. 
Robison,   Matthew,   178. 
Rocker,  John,  65,  66. 
Rockford,  C.  &  W.  Railway,  70. 
Rock  Island,  111.,  25,  27,  47,  49, 

54,  70,  71,  81,  87,  97,  102,  116, 

118,    121,    129,    130,    134,    136, 

145,    146,    152,    153,    155,    160, 

162,    164,    165,    167,    169,    175, 

177,  178,  185,  189. 
Rock  Island  Advertiser,  69. 
Rock    Island   Agricultural 

Board,  139. 
Rock    Island    County,    87,    142, 

153,  163,  164,  177,  182,  184. 
Rock  Island  County  Historical 

Society,  69,  85. 
Rock  Island  House,  158. 
Rock  Island  (island  of),  25,  55, 

56,  57,  163. 
Rock  River,  49,  53,  69,  77,  189, 

193. 
Rock   River  bottom,   47. 
Rogers,  Dr.  E.  E.,  154. 
Roggenkampf,   8. 
Rohlf,   Matthias  J.,    33,   39,    43, 

45,  46,  59. 
Rohlf,  Mrs.  M.  J.,  43,   44,  45. 
Rural   township,   155. 


>02 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  It.  JIM  BERG 


Rusch,  Nicholas  J.,  41. 
Russell,  Erwin,   188. 
Rutledge,  Rev.,  83. 

Sacliau,  Ben,  174. 
Sachau,  Daniel,  173. 
Saddoris,  Arista,  65,  66,  145. 
Saddoris,  Mrs.  Arista,  176. 
Saddoris,    Henry,    40,    76,    101, 

145,  173,   190. 
Sample,  Mrs.  Chas.,  176. 
Sanders   school  books,  82. 
Sand  prairie,  135. 
Saw  mill,  54. 
Schafer,  Truman,   174. 
Schindler,  Thomas,  155. 
Schleswig-Holstein,   5,   9. 
Schleuter,  Claus,   184. 
Schlodtfeldt,  Hans,  58. 
Schloepel,  96. 
Schmidt,  Amos,  58. 
Schmidt's  brewery,  97. 
Schmoll,  Hazel,  181. 
Schmoll,  Wm.  T.,  179,  180. 
Schmoll,  Mrs.  Wm.  T.,  179. 
Schneider,  Nick,   188. 
School,  5,   6,   31,   32,   47,  50,  51, 

60,  79,  80,  82. 
Schnoor,  Claus,  79,  184. 
Schroeder,  Fred  H.,  171. 
Schroeder,  Mrs.  Fred  H.,   134. 
Schryver,  Dan,  147. 
Schultz,    124. 
Schwenneker,  Wm.,   173. 
Scott  County,  la.,  114. 
Seams,   Charles,  173. 
Searle,  E.  J.,  178. 
Searle,  James  A.,  178. 
Sears,  Dave,  29,  178. 
Sears,  D.  B.,  54. 
Selle,  Rev.  C.  A.   T.,  81,  82,  87. 
Sell,  Jasper,  139. 
Sextons',  64. 
Shanks,  A.  B.,  123. 
Shepherd,  117. 
Shiloh,  123. 
Shuler,  Charles,  124. 
Sidlinger,  Harry,  174. 
Silvis,    Ship    (T.    S.),   155,    157, 

158,  159. 
Simpson,  Jerry,  168. 


Simpsons',   64. 

Sioux  City,  153,  183. 

Singing  school,   83,  84. 

Skinner,  Orrin,  177. 

Slilinger,  Ed.,  173. 

Slock,  John,  173. 

Smallpox,   85. 

Smith,  Clyde,  174. 

Smith,  Frank,  173. 

Smith,  John,  173. 

Snakes,  40,  41,  42,  53. 

Snaphase,  Mr.,  90. 

South  Moline,  155. 

Spaeth,  John,  135. 

Spaids',   64. 

Speck,  Mrs.,  111. 

Spencer,  John  W.,  54,   177. 

Springfield,    111.,   142.    169. 

Stage  lines,  185,  189,  190. 

Stapps  Lake,  180. 

State  museum,  181. 

Steele,  Henry  S.,  72. 

Steffen,  Claus,  123. 

Sterling,  111.,  124. 

Sterling   &   R.    I.    Railroad,    99, 

102. 
Stephens,  George,  47. 
Stevens,  A.  C,  155,  156. 
Stevens,  Constable,   114. 
Stilz,  Gottlieb,  79,  83,  120,  171. 
Stokes,  Eph.,  53. 
Stokes'  flour  mill,  141. 
Stokes,  Young,  53. 
Stoltenberg,  James,  183. 
Stone  house,  135,  190. 
Stotmeister,   Andrew,    125. 
Stout,  Levi,  82. 
Stratton,   Josiah,   181. 
Stroehle,  Joseph,  136. 
Stromer,   Gustave,   123,   128. 
Struve,  Henry,  79. 
St.  James  Hotel,  25,  46. 
St.  Louis.  24,   71,   131,  169,   169. 
Sugar  Creek,  61,  62,  190. 
Sugar  Grove,   61,   121,   184. 
Swander.   Alex.,   30,  71,   114. 
Swander,  Mrs.  Alex.,   114. 
Swisher,  James,  181. 
Sylvan  Park,  28. 


203 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARX  D.  HAUBERG 


Talcott,   D.   W„   139,   140. 

Talcott's  ferry,  77. 

Tanner,   Charlie,   190. 

Tanner,   Harvey,   190. 

Tavenner,  J.  E.,  181. 

Taylor,  James,  177. 

Taxes    76. 

Tecumseh,  Neb.,  182,  183. 

Te°~eler    155 

Tennessee,  12,  14,  24,  32,  61,  65. 

Threshers,    77,    136,     154,     185, 

186,  188. 
Tippecanoe,  22. 
Titterington,    Charles,   178. 
Tomer,  Henry,  181. 
Tomlinson's  Lake,  180. 
Torpin,  Henry,  79. 
Torpin,  Jennie  Ann,  127. 
Torpin,  Joseph,  79,  82. 
Torpin,  Lambert,  79. 
Torpin,  Richard,  79,  114,  118. 
Torpin,  Richard  Jr.,  79. 
Tri-cities,  185. 
Trowbridge,  Mrs.  David,  74. 
Trowbridge,  Merrill,  173. 
Turkeys,  wild,  55,  119. 
Turner,  — ,  73. 
Turner,  Tom,  73. 
Tuscumbia,  Ala.,  12,  22. 
Twine  binder,  186. 

University  of  Omaha,  183. 

U.  S.  Land  Office,  72. 

U.  S.  Mint,  181. 

United    Sunday    School    Band, 

175. 
Untiedt,  33. 
Upper  End,  158,   172,  173,   182, 

184. 
Upper  rapids,  70. 

Valentine,  Cyrus,  178. 
Van  der  Veer  park,  37. 
Vermont,  84,  85. 
Vicksburg,  128,  129. 
Vieths,  Claus,  37. 
Vieths,   Ditmer,   29. 
Virginia,  66,   134. 
Volks  Zeitung,  162. 

Wagner,  George,  96. 
Wagon   factory,  54,  58. 


Wainwright,  Alf.,  186. 

Walker,  Hiram,   62. 

Walker,   John,   62,  67. 

Walker,  M.  O.,  191. 

Walker,  Rufus,  179. 

Walker,    Tom    (J.    T.),    61,    62, 

139,   140. 
Walker,  Sam,  62. 
Wallace,  Hugh,  71,  73. 
Walther,  Fred,  184. 
Walther,    Charles   G.,    171,    186, 

188. 
Wandschneider,  Fritz,  123,  129. 
Wandschneider's,  184. 
Ward,  179,  180,  181,  185. 
Ward,  Theudus,  181. 
Wards,  64. 

Warnock  &  Ralston,  157. 
War  Savings  Stamps,  173. 
Warsaw,  70. 
Warsaw    &    Rockford    Ry.,    70, 

101,  102. 
Wartburg,  13,  14. 
Wiishburne,  Elihu   B.,  60. 
Wassell,  Elmer,  174. 
Waterloo,   183. 
Watertown,  118,  119. 
Weckel,  John,  47. 
Weckel,  Louis,  58. 
Weideman,  Harvey,  174. 
Weideman,  William,  174. 
Welch,  J.  W.,  179. 
Wells,  Uempsey,   174. 
Wells,  Elsie,  176. 
Wells,   Lucius,    177. 
Wells,   Mabel,  176. 
Wessel,  Dr.  P.  H.,  58. 
Western  House,  103. 
Wethersfield,  164. 
White,  Spencer  H.,  53. 
Whitehead,  Ira,  177. 
Whiteside  Co.,  78,  152,  153. 
Wiegant,  John,  136,  137,  184. 
Wiese,  Anna,  78. 
Wiese,  Frederick,  78. 
Wiese,  Henry,  78. 
Wiese,  Mrs.  Henry,  184. 
Wiese,  John,  78. 
Wiese,  Marx,  78. 
Wiese,  Peter,  123,  128. 
Wild  fowl,  76,  91. 


204 


MEMOIRS  OF  MARA  I).  II At  BERG 


Williams,   Mr.,   52. 
Williams,  Phil.,   107. 
Williams,  White  &  Co.,  29. 
Williamson,  Sam,  123. 
Willows,  Irish  gray,  189. 
Wilson,  Charley,  181. 
WTilson,  Frazier,  177. 
Wilson,  Lewis,  155. 
Wilson,  Phil,  136. 
Wilson,  Tom,  136. 
Wilson,   Woodrow    (President), 

182. 
Wiltamutho,   92. 
Winter,  Rev.  Louis,  87. 
Winterfeldt,   John,  78. 
Wire  binder,  186. 
Wisconsin,   147,   150. 
Wisconsin,  Steamboat,  24. 
Withrow,  Julia  Ann,  32. 
Woodburn,  John,  73. 


Wool  carder,  74. 
World  War,  173. 
World's  Fair,   169. 

Yost,  Rev.   George,   13. 
Young    Men's    Christian    Ass'n, 
173,   175. 

Ziegler,  Adam,  125,  126. 
Ziegler,   Ben,   125. 
Ziegler,  Charley,   125. 
Ziegler,  Dave,  125. 
Ziegler,  Ira,  174. 
Ziegler,  John,  125. 
Ziegler,  Nick,  125. 
Ziegler,   Solomon,   125. 
Ziegler,    William     (Bill),     125, 

145. 
Zieglers',   64. 
Zuma  Township,   32. 


205 


LIST  OF  ILLUSTRATIONS 

PAGE 

Marx  D.   Hauberg,   the   author 2 

Mrs.  M.  D.  Hauberg,  wife  of  the  author 3 

Mrs.   John   D.   Hauberg,  mother 4 

Public  school,  Raisdorf,  Germany    6 

Village  scene,  Raisdorf   7 

Church  at   Preetz,   Germany    9 

Elmschenhagen   smithy    10 

The  old   family  kettle    21 

Moline    in   the   Fifties    26 

The  Gordon  school    31 

Antoine  Le  Claire    56 

Col.    George    Davenport   homestead 57 

The  log  cabin  at  Sugar  Grove 63 

Remains  of  ditch-and-wall   fence    68 

Mother's   spinning   wheel    70 

Military  bounty  land  certificate   71 

The  wool  carder    74 

An  1854  tax  receipt    76 

The  melodeon   84 

1857  confirmation   certificate    86 

Henry    Frels    88 

Diamond  Jo  warehouse  at  Cordova 98 

Warsaw  &  Rockford  Railway,  stock  receipt 101 

Mr.  and   Mrs.   Gottlieb   Stilz    120 

Three  sisters,  Catherine,  Margaret  and  Elizabeth  Hauberg.  .  122 

Mr.  and  Mrs.  Jergen  D.  Hauberg  and  son 125 

Early    day    lanterns    132 

The  Henry  Frels  homestead    133 

The  stone  residence    137 

Officers'  race,  Hillsdale  Fair 139 

Flour  mill  at  Cleveland    141 

Officers,  Coe  Fair    145 

The    branding    iron     148 

At  the  Middle  Crossing  151 

Lime  Kiln  at  Port  Byron   157 

Old   Fort   Armstrong    163 

Returned  soldier  boys  of  the  World  War 173,  174 

The  barbecue  at  Fairfield    175 

Red  Cross  ladies    • 176 

Old  Settlers'  Association  group 179 

Group  of  Civil  War  veterans    181 

A  threshing  machine  of  1890    185 

The  "Horse  Power"    186 

A  thresher  group    188 

The   "catfish    hole"    192 

20G 


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